HAMAS ♥ Mary Jo Kilroy

Mary Jo Kilroy and friends
UPDATE: Check out our new post on the topic, "Mary Jo Kilroy locks up the Ohio 15th female HAMAS vote".

It hardly seems like a year since Mary Jo Kilroy and her employees were helping Kilroy comrade and Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) national vice chairman Ahmad Al-Akhras stonewall and cover-up the illegal appointment of Al-Akhras business partner Abukar Arman by the Franklin County Board of Commissioners (of which Kilroy is president) to the Franklin County Criminal Justice Planning Board, which oversees area homeland security. Kilroy claimed to have no involvement in Arman’s appointment (more on that later), which was illegal by virtue of the fact that he is not a US citizen and thereby barred from serving according to Ohio law. (Yes, they had a foreign national who had openly praised HAMAS helping overseeing our homeland security, but don’t worry — the Columbus Dispatch said it was all OK, because he wasn’t a terrorist!)

But in the weeks that followed the Arman county commission kerfuffle, Ahmad Al-Akhras saw fit to reward Mary Jo Kilroy’s never-ending congressional campaign for the Ohio 15th Congressional District with two donations totaling $750. By the end of 2007, Al-Akhras had fully doled out $1000 to Kilroy’s campaign — with the last contribution coming less than a month before Al-Akhras fled the country to take a job with the government of Dubai. FEC reports showing Al-Akhras’ 2007 contributions to Kilroy are below.

Mary Jo Kilroy accepted these donations AFTER CAIR — the very same organization that Al-Akhras heads — had been named by federal prosecutors as an unindicted co-conspirator in a terrorism finance trial. And as the Investigative Project has noted, CAIR has been identified as one of the key components of the HAMAS terrorist support infrastructure in the US. Not by me. By federal prosecutors.

In fact, around the time of Al-Akhras’ last contribution to Mary Jo Kilroy’s campaign, the Department of Justice identified CAIR as a longtime terrorist support operation in a legal brief filed in another terrorism-related case (for more see, “For the Record: Government Reminds Court of CAIR/MAS Ties to Terrorists”).

Here is what the DOJ said about Mary Jo Kilroy’s friends at CAIR:

Moreover, since its founding by Muslim Brotherhood leaders, CAIR conspired with other affiliates of the Muslim Brotherhood to support terrorists. (DOJ Brief No. 07-4778, USA v. Benkahla, Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, p. 58)

Oh, I just happen to have an image of that statement taken from the DOJ brief:



And it was more than a decade ago that Steve Pomerantz, former FBI chief of counterterrorism, made the very same assessment about CAIR’s ties to international terrorism:

Any objective assessment of the material presented above leads to the conclusion that CAIR, its leaders, and its activities, effectively give aid to international terrorist groups. Unfortunately, CAIR is but one of a new generation of new groups in the United States that hide under a veneer of “civil rights” or “academic” status but in fact are tethered to a platform that support terrorism. The degree to which these groups are able to deceive the American public and intimidate writers and counter-terrorist officials will be a significant ingredient in whether this country will be rendered more vulnerable to terrorism in future years. (“Counterterrorism in a Free Society,” The Journal of Counterterrorism & Security International 5:1, Spring 1998, p. 26)

And what, you may ask, is Abukar Arman up to these days now that he’s not helping oversee Franklin County homeland security? That’s right. He’s now the new president of CAIR-Columbus.

Exit question: Are HAMAS, CAIR, and Ahmad Al-Akhras the kinds of friends that Democratic congressional candidate Mary Jo Kilroy wants to be associated with?

Two separate contributions by Ahmad Al-Akhras to Kilroy for Congress (8/29/07, 9/29/07) for $750 [click to enlarge; original]


Additional $250 contribution (12/03/07) by Ahmad Al-Akhras to Kilroy for Congress [click to enlarge; original]

Where’s CAIR on Christopher Paul?

That’s the question I ask today in my FrontPage article, “CAIR Mum on Ohio Al-Qaeda Guilty Plea”:

Earlier this month Christopher Paul stood before a federal judge in Columbus, Ohio and pled guilty to receiving training in Al-Qaeda terror camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan, fighting with Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Bosnia, and passing that training on to other Muslims in the US and Europe with the intent to kill Americans at home and abroad as part of a plea deal with federal prosecutors to avoid conviction on even more charges.

Since then, however, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has been curiously silent on Paul’s guilty plea, with no press releases, media interviews or angry editorials on the matter for nearly three weeks. And any mention of Christopher Paul and his Columbus Al-Qaeda co-conspirators has been tellingly scrubbed from CAIR’s website.

This is especially curious considering the media full-court press that some CAIR officials engaged in when he was arrested in April 2007. At that time CAIR had no reservations about speaking publicly on the matter, as evidenced by the public protestations of Paul’s innocence by CAIR national vice-chairman, go-to friend of terrorists, and sometime pugilist Ahmad Al-Akhras, who defended his Al-Qaeda associate to the Associated Press:

Ahmad Al-Akhras, vice chair of the Columbus chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, knows Paul and said the charges are out of character.

“From the things I know, he is a loving husband and he has a wife and parents in town,” Al-Akhras said Thursday. “They are a good family together.”

Al-Akhras said he and others in the Muslim community are guarding against a public backlash.

“People start wondering and questioning, what is happening and why now?” he said. “When something like this pops up, it creates some anxiety among the members of the Muslim community. . . . We hope nothing bad will happen and everything will be clear.”

Two of Christopher Paul’s Ohio Al-Qaeda associates, Iyman Faris and Nuradin Abdi, are already serving prison sentences for their role in the Columbus Al-Qaeda cell (from court documents at least 10 others are known to have been involved, but have not yet been charged). As noted by Andrew Cochran at Counterterrorism Blog, Paul’s admission to his extensive collaboration with international terrorist plots going back to the early 1990s and the statement of facts in the case indicates that he is the earliest known American Al-Qaeda operative.

In each of these cases of the Columbus Al-Qaeda cell, CAIR has initially rushed to publicly defend these men from the charges and to flog their own grievance-mongering agenda. But as the full scope of their involvement in the terrorist network became clear they attempted to distance themselves and their organizations from the terrorist network, while still attempting to promote their agenda and give their terrorist associates as much cover as possible.

For instance, after Iyman Faris had pled guilty to felony terrorism charges, Al-Akhras business partner Mohammad Tarazi (whose wife serves as the corporate secretary for CAIR-OH), was dispatched to speak to a local TV station to float the story that Faris was mentally ill and possessed by demons:

An Islamic religious leader said an Ohio trucker who pleaded guilty to felony terrorism charges had once claimed he was possessed by demons and attempted suicide.

Mouhamed Nabih Tarazi volunteers as an imam to lead prayer services at various sites around Columbus. He performed the marriage ceremony for Iyman Faris, but said Faris did not attend services regularly because he was often on the road.

Tarazi said he never heard Faris talk about politics, but thinks he might have been mentally ill.

“He did have some mental problems. We did not know about these problems when he was married,” Tarazi said.

Here Tarazi is attempting to deal with the guilty plea aftermath by simultaneously distance the mosque (Masjid Omar Ibn El Khattab, which was the hub of the Columbus Al-Qaeda cell) from Faris while explaining away his behavior with bizarre claims of mental illness and demon possession to still give cover for his friend — a claim that magically appeared only after the guilty plea.

Nuradin Abdi’s arrest was more difficult for CAIR-OH to address as Abdi was known to have been an active in Masjid Omar and was one of the leaders of the local Al-Maghrib Institute (aka “Jihad U”) chapter.

So it’s not surprising that Ahmad Al-Akhras rushed to defend Abdi to the local media:

“What we know about him is unlike how he is portrayed,” said Ahmad Al-Akhras, president of the Ohio office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

The group’s leaders questioned the evidence and the timing of the announcement of charges against Abdi, noting that the FBI has dropped charges accusing others of terrorism.

“This may be one of the cases also that may not have enough evidence or there’s no evidence at all,” Al-Akhras said.

CAIR-OH actively aided Abdi’s defense team by parroting their bogus narrative that Abdi had been tortured in prison by US officials and was exhibiting signs of mental illness because of this alleged abuse.

This time it was CAIR-OH president Asma Mobin-Uddin who was dispatched to do the group’s dirty work. She penned an op-ed for the Columbus Dispatch invoking her credentials as a physician to attest to Abdi’s mental state:

As a physician, I am extremely concerned that his behaviors might indicate mental and possibly physical abuse during his detention, and that his mental injuries may be permanent.

Area Marxist moonbat Harvey Wasserman and Columbus State professor and fellow moonbat Bob Fitrakis also parroted this theme of Abdi’s alleged torture:

In court, Abdi looked nothing like a terrorist — or his former self. His family and the larger Somali community here were horrified to see Abdi enter the courtroom smiling vacantly and failing to recognize his own brother. Apparently unconscious of his surroundings, Abdi banged his head repeatedly on a table and grinned at nothing. Many who know Abdi in the central Ohio community say the vague, sensational charges against him are absurdly out of character.

No photos have emerged of abuse in prison. But Abdi’s new attorney, his family and the community who knew him find little else to conclude. Some say he has apparently lost his mind under the conditions of his incarceration.

The problem with Mobin-Uddin’s narrative of Abdi’s torture and mental collapse, however, is that she is a pediatrician, not a psychiatrist, and had a definite conflict of interest in her bogus diagnosis. And unfortunately for CAIR-OH, when actual mental health officials examined Abdi, they found that he was faking symptoms of mental illness in an attempt to avoid the 80 years in prison that he possibly faced. A federal appeals court also rebuffed his lawyers’ attempt to suppress incriminating statements he made at the time of his arrest.

Notwithstanding Abdi’s eventual guilty plea, Asma Mobin-Uddin still features her Columbus Dispatch editorial in defense of Abdi on her personal website. And when a local Muslim columnist, Mahmoud El-Yousseph, conceded Abdi’s guilt and proper punishment and chastised CAIR-OH for refusing to withdraw their support for the terrorist, he was publicly rebuked by Ahmad Al-Akhras and others for deviating from the CAIR line of maintaining Abdi’s innocence at all costs.

The most recent guilty plea by Columbus Al-Qaeda member Christopher Paul, however, provided a particularly difficult conundrum. Not only was Paul an active and well-known member of Masjid Omar, for years he had been the martial arts instructor for the mosque, presumably providing members there with jihadist training. This no doubt prompted Al-Akhras’ full-court media press at the time of Paul’s arrest.

And now that Paul has admitted his guilt and acknowledged that he had conspired to use weapons of mass destruction against US citizens at home and abroad, CAIR’s continued silence is as condemning as the respective guilty pleas by Iyman Faris, Nuradin Abdi and Christopher Paul. Considering that our local terrorist cell is the largest known Al-Qaeda operation in the US since 9/11, and that these convicted terrorists were close associates to CAIR officials (by their own admission), the campaign of silence by CAIR has becoming deafening.

OSUMSA speaker Sami Al-Arian indicted — AGAIN

Bad news for local supporters of Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorist leader Sami Al-Arian, who was indicted against today for contempt for refusing to testify before a federal grand jury looking into terrorism financing by Al-Arian’s former benefactor, the International Institute for Islamic Thought. Al-Arian remains in prison for refusing to testify before a federal grand jury about the involvement of his associates in terrorist financing in the US.

Here’s a few paragraphs from a report today by the Investigative Project on Terrorism describing the new charges:

Convicted terrorist Sami Al-Arian has been indicted in Virginia on two counts of criminal contempt after refusing to testify before a federal grand jury despite a grant of immunity.

Al-Arian, who pled guilty in 2006 to conspiring to provide goods and services to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, has argued that his plea agreement ruled out any cooperation with the government. Two appellate courts, the 4th Circuit and 11th Circuit have rejected that argument, saying no such agreement is in the written plea and was not uttered during Al-Arian’s plea hearing.

The indictment offers few details, except to give Oct. 16, 2007 and March 20, 2008 as the dates of his alleged criminal contempt. The grand jury’s focus is believed to be on terror financing by the Herndon, Va.-based International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT).

IIIT was the single biggest donor for Al-Arian’s Tampa-based think tank, the World and Islam Studies Enterprise (WISE). The president of IIIT Al-Arian wrote a letter in 1992 referring to WISE as an extension of IIIT.

IIIT also housed Bashir Musa Nafi, one of the original founders of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. In 1995, Al-Arian sponsored a petition for a workers visa on behalf of Nafi to allow him to work as a research director employed by WISE. However, Nafi was actually employed by IIIT, and false information on his INS petition leading to Nafi’s deportation to London in June 1996.

Back in April we noted that in 2002 Al-Arian was a featured speaker for the Ohio State Muslim Student Association (“OSUMSA speaker and convicted terrorist leader enters fifth year in prison”).

That would also be the same Sami Al-Arian who delivered his infamous “Let us damn America!” speech at the Islamic Center of Cleveland. You can see Imam Fawaz Damra’s introduction of Al-Arian, where he acknowledges that Al-Arian’s organization is “the active arm of the Islamic Jihad movement in Palestine”. Nor can we forget his other greatest video hit, the “Jihad is our path, death to Israel” diatribe. Both of these speeches were BEFORE he spoke at the OSUMSA event.

Moderate Islam in full bloom in Central Ohio!

CAIR-Ohio funded Al-Qaeda Legal Team

Matthew Vadum at Newsbusters today exposes the deep pockets that are financing the legal team of the Al-Qaeda terrorists held at Gitmo, and discovers that one of the financial backers of this effort is none other than CAIR-Ohio [HT: Tom Blumer]:

Much has already been written of the U.S. Supreme Court’s lawless, nonsensical decision in Boumediene v. Bush that gives America’s terrorist enemies unprecedented access to our civilian court system, but little has been written about the aggressively anti-American public interest law firm that helped to make it happen.*

The nonprofit Center for Constitutional Rights, which acted as co-counsel in the case, is deeply enmeshed in the politics of terrorism (take one guess on whose side) and has even taken money from groups linked to terrorism. CCR donors include the Ohio branch of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), Safa Trust Inc., and the International Institute of Islamic Thought, all of which have been accused of connections to Islamist terror groups.

For more background on CAIR-OH’s support of CCR, see this Capital Research Center report, “The Terrorists Legal Team” and NGO Monitor’s report on CCR’s “Serial Abuse of International Law”.

Just as a reminder, recall that Salim Hamdan was Osama bin Laden’s driver, and Lakhdar Boumediene and his five associates were taken into custody to prevent an attack on the US Embassy in Bosnia.

Did some of that CAIR-Ohio money funding Al-Qaeda’s law firm came from the fundraiser featuring 1993 World Trade Center bombing unindicted co-conspirator Siraj Wahhaj, who helped raise $100,000 for CAIR-OH as the keynote speaker at their 2006 annual banquet, or the 2007 CAIR-OH annual banquet featuring Governor Ted Strickland?

For a good analysis of why granting habeas corpus rights to unlawful enemy combatants and other terrorists captured in the field is a significant departure from accepted international rules of warfare and American jurisprudence, see Timothy Furnish’s recent article, “Supreme Ignorance: America’s High Court Disregards the Laws of Land Warfare,” and former US Senator Fred Thompson’s piece at Pajamas Media (one of my writing homes), “Boumediene: A Supremely Problematic Court Decision”.

As Justice Scalia observed in his dissent in Boumediene:

Today, for the first time in our Nation’s history, the Court confers a constitutional right to habeas corpus on alien enemies detained abroad by our military forces in the course of an ongoing war.

And Chief Justice Roberts:

Today the Court strikes down as inadequate the most generous set of procedural protections ever afforded aliens detained by this country as enemy combatants. The political branches crafted these procedures amidst an ongoing military conflict, after much careful investigation and thorough debate. The Court rejects them today out of hand, without bothering to say what due process rights the detainees possess, without explaining how the statute fails to vindicate those rights, and before a single petitioner has even attempted to avail himself of the law’s operation. And to what effect? The majority merely replaces a review system designed by the people’s representatives with a set of shapeless procedures to be defined by federal courts at some future date. One cannot help but think, after surveying the modest practical results of the majority’s ambitious opinion, that this decision is not really about the detainees at all, but about control of federal policy regarding enemy combatants.

Islamic group coming to Columbus in August scheduled Pakistani terror leader as speaker

UPDATE #1: Naresh Raghubeer of the Canadian Coalition for Democracies, the organization that opposed Qazi Hussein Ahmad’s entry into Canada for the ISNA conference last month, reports that Qazi was eventually denied a visa by the Canadian government as a result of the public outcry and political pressure, preventing him from speaking at the ISNA conference.

Original post: On August 29th, the Islamic Society of North American (ISNA) will be having their 45th annual US convention at the Columbus Convention Center. The ISNA convention’s host is the Islamic Society of Greater Columbus (ISGC).

As I report today at PJM, “North American Islamic Group Hosts Pakistani Terror Leader”, ISNA invited Qazi Hussain Ahmad, the head of the Jamaat-e-Islami terrorist organization to speak at their conference in Toronto, Canada just last month. Qazi has been banned by more than two dozen countries in Europe and the Middle East.

Does this portend the kind of extremism that will be brought into our own community in just two months time?

Here’s the opening of the article:

Qazi Hussein Ahmad has been banned from more than 25 countries across Europe and the Middle East for the activities of the Pakistani Jamaat-e-Islami (JEI) organization that he heads. Terrorism analysts around the world have noted JEI’s close ties to al-Qaeda, and Qazi has publicly defended Osama bin Laden, admitting to meeting with him on several occasions and claiming that no definitive proof exists of bin Laden’s involvement in the 9/11 attacks. In an October 2002 interview with Der Speigel Qazi went so far as to deny al-Qaeda’s existence altogether and defended his group’s support of the Taliban, saying that “they were just and honorable men, who brought peace to Afghanistan.”

With that kind of extremist rhetoric and close associations with known terrorist organizations currently at war with the United States, it is troubling that the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) had Qazi Hussein Ahmad as one of its featured speakers at its annual Canadian conference last month. The ISNA-Canada conference was run jointly with the Muslim Students Association and Muslim Youth of North America, and endorsed by the Canadian Council on American-Islamic Relations, the Islamic Circle of North America, and the Muslim Association of Canada.

The program for the ISNA conference lists Qazi Hussein Ahmad speaking at their seventh session on Saturday, May 24, on the topic of “Religious Extremism: Fact or Fiction.” This was not his first time at an ISNA conference, however, as he was featured at the group’s 1998 35th annual convention held in St. Louis, where Qazi was one of two speakers on the topic of “Human Dignity in the Muslim World: The Case of Pakistan and Algeria.”

Qazi’s appearance at the ISNA-Canada conference was denounced by the Canadian Coalition for Democracies, which demanded that the government immediately review and reconsider his visa application, especially since Jamaat-e-Islami has been designated a terrorist organization by the Canadian government. ISNA’s decision to include the JEI leader in their event was strongly criticized by Calgary Herald columnist Rob Breakenridge, who used the occasion to question Canadians’ paradoxical “tolerant society.”

[article continued]

To verify Qazi Hussain Ahmad’s scheduled appearance at the ISNA conference, here’s the conference flier with him listed prominently as one of their speakers (original here):

CBS News: Toledo terror trio connected to other terrorist cells

Columbus native Bob Orr of CBS News reports that the Toledo terror trio convicted last week were tied to other terror cells in Chicago, Atlanta, Toronto, and an Al-Qaeda webmaster in the UK:


But don’t think that there is a terrorism problem in the Buckeye State. Everyone go back to sleep.

BREAKING: Toledo Terror Trio Guilty on All Charges

UPDATE #1: Added video coverage below from WTOL-11 Toledo.

It’s been a bad month for jihadists in the Buckeye State. This afternoon, a jury found three Toledo men, Mohammad Amawi, Marwan El-Hindi, and Wassim Mazloum, guilty on all charges of plotting to kill US soldiers overseas. Amawi and El-Hindi were also convicted of distributing information regarding explosives to terrorists. This follows last week’s guilty plea by Columbus Al-Qaeda member Christopher Paul to charges of joining and fighting with Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Bosnia, and training jihadists from Central Ohio and Europe to kill Americans at home and abroad.

Here’s part of the report this afternoon from the Toledo Blade:

A federal jury on Friday convicted three Toledo-area men of Middle Eastern descent of plotting attacks against U.S. troops overseas and other terror-related acts.

Mohammad Amawi, Marwan El-Hindi, and Wassim Mazloum, all of whom are Muslim, were convicted on all counts of conspiring to kill or injure people outside the United States and face sentences of life in prison.

Prosecutors said the men were learning to shoot guns and make explosives while raising money to fund their plans to wage a holy war against U.S. troops.

“Today’s verdicts should send a strong message to individuals who would use this country as a platform to plot attacks against U.S. military personnel in Iraq and elsewhere,” said Patrick Rowan, acting Assistant Attorney General for National Security, in a written statement.

“This case also underscores the need for continued vigilance in identifying and dismantling extremist plots that develop in America’s heartland.”

Amen to that.

Deafening silence from CAIR-Ohio will commence in 5 . . . 4 . . . 3 . . .

UPDATE #1:

What Columbus Al-Qaeda cell member Christopher Paul pled guilty to

Notwithstanding local Muslim leader Basil Mohamed Gohar’s bizarre and self-serving claims that Christopher Paul and his local Al-Qaeda associates are innocent, Christopher Paul changed his plea to guilty on the charge of conspiring to use weapons of mass destruction against Americans.

Andy Cochran at Counterterrorism Blog has a good summary, “Earliest Known ‘American Al-Qaeda’ Pleads Guilty to Terrorism Charges”, but it is helpful to review the statement of facts released today by the Department of Justice to understand the scope of Christopher Paul’s crimes, and how critical his involvement was to establishing and training the “jihadist” network in Central Ohio.

* * *

Statement of Facts
Investigation by the Columbus, Ohio FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF), through interviews of international and U.S.-based witnesses and the analysis of thousands of physical exhibits, many of which were recovered from defendant’s residences, establish that the defendant, Christopher Paul, provided material support and resources to terrorists by providing himself and others; by providing training; and by providing equipment, knowing and intending that such support would be used in preparation for or in carrying out a conspiracy to destroy property and causing the death and/or serious injury of human beings, which for purposes of this statement of facts will be referred to as “committing jihad.”

1. Since 1989, defendant Christopher Paul has been known by a number of aliases: including Abdul, Abdul Malek, Abdul Malik, Abdul Melik, Abdel Malek, Abdulmaled, Abdul Malek Kenyatta, Paul Kenyatta Laws, Paul Laws, hereinafter (“defendant”). Defendant is a United States citizen.



2. In the early 1990s, defendant traveled to Pakistan and Afghanistan to join the mujahadeen. Upon his arrival in Pakistan, defendant stayed at the Beit Ul Ansar guest house, located in Peshawar, Pakistan. Beit Ul Ansar was a guest house affiliated with al Qaeda. While at Beit Ul Ansar, defendant went to Afghanistan and received initial training at an al Qaeda training camp. The training included, but was not limited to, map reading, climbing, use of assault rifles, grenades, rocket-propelled grenades, small unit tactics, and hand-to-hand combat. Successfully completing his initial training defendant joined al Qaeda and then stayed at Beit ur Salam guesthouse, which was exclusively for al Qaeda members. Distinguishing himself to al Qaeda, defendant was selected for and obtained advanced training in rappelling, military history, and explosives and explosive devices. Upon joining al Qaeda and having received their training, the defendant fought with other mujahadeen in Afghanistan.



3. After fighting in Afghanistan, defendant returned to the United States for a period and began instructing individuals in martial arts at a mosque in Columbus, Ohio. Defendant also began recruiting and associating with individuals with jihadist intentions in order to establish a jihadist group in Columbus, Ohio.



4. Over time and through his association with al Qaeda, the defendant became an individual dedicated to committing jihad, including causing the death of human beings and the destruction of property and furthering the objectives of al Qaeda and other radical Islamic fundamentalists.



5. From 1993 through 1995 defendant, using various passports and aliases, returned to the Balkans area in Europe and fought jihad in conflict zones such as Bosnia establishing further contacts with the radical Islamic fundamentalist movement and creating a master list of contact numbers for senior al-Qaeda leadership and other radical Islamic fundamentalists and operatives world-wide. On this master list, investigators also found listings of component parts for bombs/detonation devices. Defendant’s master list of terrorist contacts and bomb-making information was seized by the Columbus JTTF in a search warrant at defendant’s residence.



6. The defendant returned to Columbus after jihad in the Balkans. In January 1997, defendant received a fax from two al Qaeda, radical Islamic fundamentalist coconspirators from Europe asking, on behalf of “the brothers,” for Paul to find them a “true group and place to make jihad.” The term “brothers” is a euphemism for fellow radical Islamic fundamentalists, AQ members, or mujahadeen. The fax is in the possession of the Columbus JTTF.



7. While in Columbus, as established by state park records, defendant and others stayed at Burr Oak state park and witnesses establish that defendant conducted hiking, camping, and other training operations in Burr Oak State Park in Ohio with several members of his local jihadist group replicating terrorist training defendant had received in conflict zones such as Afghanistan and Bosnia.



8. Preparing to travel overseas again, on February 3, 1999, as established by official passport records, defendant obtained a passport in the name of “Christopher Paul,” after defendant had claimed “water damage” to his old passport in one of his other aliases.



9. Beginning in March 31, 1999 through January 31, 2000, as established by defendant’s own phone records, on forty-four (44) occasions, defendant called a radical Islamic fundamentalist co-conspirator in Europe who in 2003 was arrested and has since been convicted of a terrorist conspiracy.



10. As established by defendant’s passport and cooperating witnesses, on April 16, 1999, defendant traveled to Germany to meet with members of a radical Islamic fundamentalist terrorist cell in Germany. Paul, who was known to the cell as an expert in bomb-making/detonation devices, was asked to travel to Germany to provide explosives training and information to this German terrorist cell.



11. The government’s investigation and witnesses establish that defendant provided such training knowing that the German terrorist cell was planning to use such training and information to construct bombs, car bombs, and similar devices to be used against Americans while they vacationed at foreign tourist resorts.



12. The government’s investigation and witnesses establish that the German terrorist cell also planned to use bombs and similar devices against Americans within the United States and against property that was owned, leased, or used by the United States outside the United States such as U.S. embassies, diplomatic and consular premises and military bases located in Europe.



13. After Germany, defendant returned to Columbus, Ohio. In May 1999, defendant had a member of the “true group” he had formed in Columbus purchase a printer/scanner for the defendant. This printer/scanner was then shipped to one of the German terrorist cell members Paul met with in April 1999. The document scanner was to assist the German cell in the manufacture of fraudulent documents which would then be used to facilitate the travel of jihadists worldwide. The cell member, however, did not claim the package in Germany and it was sent back to defendant and later recovered by the Columbus FBI JTTF.



14. During this period defendant also purchased other equipment to be used by jihadists as part of the conspiracy, including a laser range finder and night vision equipment. Similar items were recovered during search warrants executed by the Columbus FBI JTTF.



15. In November 1999, defendant’s bank records show defendant wired transferred $1,760 to one of the principal members of the German terrorist cell.

All of the foregoing evidence establishes that, from at least April 1999 through January 2000, the defendant, Christopher Paul, agreed with at least one other person to become a member of a conspiracy which intended to use a weapon of mass destruction, namely explosive devices, against one or more of the following: U.S. nationals outside the United States; persons or property within the United States affecting interstate or foreign commerce; and/or, property that was owned, leased, or used by the United States.

* * *
So here’s what we have in summary:

1. Christopher Paul traveled to Pakistan and Afghanistan to train in Al-Qaeda camps;



2. Christopher Paul “joined Al-Qaeda” and fought with Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan;



3. Christopher Paul returned to Columbus and began training “a jihadist group” out of a local mosque (Masjid Omar Ibn El Khattab);



4. Christopher Paul was “dedicated to committing jihad” and “furthering the objectives of Al-Qaeda”;



5. Christopher Paul fought with Al-Qaeda in Bosnia;



6. Christopher Paul compiled a “master list” of international terrorist contacts, which was recovered by the FBI;



7. Christopher Paul conducted training sessions for “his local jihadist group” at Burr Oak State Park;



8. Christopher Paul contacted a member of the German terrorist cell on forty-four different occasions;



9. Christopher Paul traveled to Germany to assist in training that terrorist cell in bomb-making and explosives;



10. Christopher Paul knew that this training would be used against American citizens;



11. Christopher Paul obtained materials to support the German terror cell’s operations;



12. Christopher Paul wired money to the German terrorist cell.

This was all admitted to in Paul’s plea agreement today (version initialed and signed by Paul at the Columbus Dispatch). Paragraph 16, pg. 6 of that plea agreement reads in part:

The defendant acknowledges that no threats have been made against him and that he is pleading guilty, freely and voluntarily, because he is guilty.

Paul signed that plea agreement admitting his guilt. That seems more than some of our self-appointed local Muslim leaders and loudmouths can admit.

Local Muslim leader defends convicted Columbus Al-Qaeda cell members

There are times when even our local jihadists shock and amaze me. This is one such occasion.

Later today, local Al-Qaeda terror cell member Christopher Paul will plead guilty in federal court to conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction against Americans. He faces life in prison, but it appears that he will receive a sentence of 20 years as part of his plea agreement. Much like his other co-conspirators, Iyman Faris and Nuradin Abdi, he is making this plea of his own free will.

So what is shocking is that one of the leaders of our local Al-Maghrib Institute chapter, Basil Mohamed Gohar, circulated an email earlier today defending these Al-Qaeda terrorist cell members; not only going so far as to protest their innocence in the face of their own guilty pleas, but to ask others to pray for their early release and for their elevation in Paradise!

Al-Maghrib is a traveling Wahhabist roadshow that preaches an extremist and exclusivist version of Islam. The organization’s rabid anti-Semitism, Holocaust denials, and militaristic preaching of jihad even have other Muslims expressing concern about the radicalizing effect of Al-Maghrib’s preaching and programs. Gohar is the former “ameer” of the Columbus chapter, Qabeelat Hayl, and another one of Qabeelat Hayl’s founding fathers was none other than Nuradin Abdi, Christopher Paul’s convicted Al-Qaeda cell co-conspirator. Thus, Al-Maghrib has rightly earned the moniker, “Jihad U”. (See our previous posts on Al-Maghrib’s activity and events in Central Ohio.)

Gohar also heads up a local outfit, “Building Muslim Leaders”. This group just recently held a workshop in Columbus on “The Pursuit of Excellence”, which featured both Gohar as one of the featured speakers.

So it is especially disconcerting that an individual who is devoting so much time and energy into training local Muslim leaders is not only quick to defend our three local Al-Qaeda convicts, who as I already noted have all pled guilty of their own accord. Gohar’s email message is reproduced in its entirety below (thanks to the member of the Muslim community who forwarded it to me, but remains anonymous for fear of retaliation by these extremists).

To: [removed]
From: “Basil Mohamed Gohar”
Subject: Brother expected to plead guilty
Date: Mon, 02 Jun 2008 14:51:06 -0400

Bismillaahir Rahmaanir Raheem

Assalaamu ʿalaykum wa Rahmatullaahi wa Barakaatuh

In shaaʾ Allaah this e-mail finds you all in the very best of health & ever-increasing imaan!!!

I was checking the weather today, and my heart sank when I read the following news on the front page:

http://10tv.com/live/content/local/stories/2008/06/02/paul_plea.html?sid=102

COLUMBUS, Ohio — A Worthington man accused of plotting to help al-Qaida agreed Monday to plead guilty to working with terrorists.

Christopher Paul will plead guilty to a charge of conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction, 10TV News reported.

He is expected to make the plea in court on Tuesday.

According to prosecutors, Paul, 44, worked with Iyman Faris and Nuradin Abdi, who plotted to help raise money and provide equipment for al-Qaida.

Both Abdi and Faris pleaded guilty to the charges and are serving time in a federal prison.

Paul, born Paul Kenyatta Laws, changed his name to Abdulmalek Kenyatta in 1989 and to Christopher Paul in 1994. He is said to have obtained passports in several names.

Stay with 10TV News and 10TV.com for continuing coverage.

Just as the case with both Iyman & Nuradin, the idea that they are guilty of any wrongdoing, whether it be by US law or otherwise, is ridiculous, as anyone that knows them and knows even a little of their cases can attest to. Sadly, these brothers will stand a chance of being released much earlier if they plead guilty than if they fight through the courts and try to “prove” their innocence. The way these cases have been prosecuted has been a travesty and has been devoid of any kind of justice or due process, with the verdicts, as is common in most “terrorism”-related cases, having been decided long before these brothers were ever apprehended.

I ask Allaah to make the brothers and their families patient through these trying times and to expedite their release for captivity and to let this be a means of elevating their status in the aakhirah.

Wassalaamu ʿalaykum

If anything has been a travesty with respect to the legal process against Gohar’s associates, it has been the willingness of the self-proclaimed Muslim leaders to openly defend these terrorists at every turn! Let’s not forget that according to court documents filed in Iyman Faris’ case, after the FBI turned him, they watched as Faris communicated directly with Al-Qaeda operations chief Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in real time. And Christopher Paul trained in Al-Qaeda camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan — training he intended to use to kill Americans. These facts are not in dispute.

These individuals, such as Basil Mohamed Gohar, Ahmad Al-Akhras and Asma Mobin-Uddin, and the groups and organizations they represent, including CAIR-Ohio and Al-Maghrib Institute, sully the reputation of the entire Muslim community when they falsely claim to speak in its name and declare the innocence of these convicted and self-confessed terrorists. But as I have stated repeatedly, these individuals have NEVER been elected by people they claim to represent, and one only need look at their most recent published IRS tax filings to discover that officially CAIR-Ohio has no membership! Zero. Zilch. Nada.

The only way to combat Islamic radicalization and to defeat jihadist recruitment in our area is for local Muslims to begin to speak out against such outrages and to publicly oppose those terror apologists who claim to speak in the Muslim community’s name. Christopher Paul’s guilty plea should be a clear indicator that it must take place sooner rather than later.

BREAKING: Columbus Al-Qaeda cell member Christopher Paul to plead guilty!

UPDATE #1: Added local news video from 10TV reporter Maureen Kocot below.

UPDATE #2: For those not familiar with the terror problem in the Columbus area, I’ve also added below the 5 minute CBN News feature from last October, “Jihad in Central Ohio” (link is to video text; video below).

UPDATE #3: Incredible as it seems, take a gander at my most recent post, “Local Muslim leader defends convicted Columbus Al-Qaeda cell members”.

UPDATE #4: Now that Paul has officially pled guilty, see my wrap-up, "What Columbus Al-Qaeda cell member Christopher Paul pled guilty to".

This is breaking news, but it is being reported today that Columbus Al-Qaeda cell member Christopher “Kenyatta” Paul has agreed to plead guilty to a charge of conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction. While two of Paul’s conspirators, Iyman Faris and Nuradin Abdi, have already been convicted on terrorism charges, we also know from court documents in these three cases that there are at least 10 others known to have been involved in the Columbus Al-Qaeda cell that have not yet been charged.

You might remember that several prominent Muslim organizations and self-appointed Islamic spokesmen (CAIR National Vice Chairman Ahmad Al-Akhras included) openly criticized Paul’s April 2007 arrest as evidence of Islamophobia (see Erick Stakelbeck’s CBN News article, “Columbus Al-Qaeda Man Charged, CAIR not pleased”). What is CAIR’s response today? Nothing appears on their website. For Al-Akhras’ comments regarding Christopher Paul and his other convicted terrorist associates, see my FrontPage article, “Hometown Jihad: Getting By With a Little Help from His (Terrorist) Friends”. Oh, and Christopher Paul was the longtime martial arts instructor at Masjid Omar Ibn El Khattab, where Ahmad Al-Akhras attended before fleeing the country earlier this year.

Also recall that local wackademic, Ohio State National Security Studies chair John Mueller has published a book, “Overblown: How Politicians and the Terrorism Industry Inflate National Security Threats, and Why We Believe Them”, and created a cottage industry of touring the country claiming that there is no domestic threat from Al-Qaeda to the United States. No doubt Mr. Mueller is not available today for comment.

Here’s the Associated Press report:

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Court documents say an Ohio man will plead guilty in an alleged plot to bomb overseas U.S. military facilities and European resorts.

Christopher Paul of the Columbus suburb of Worthington is the last of three Ohio men charged with alleged terrorist activities.

Documents filed Monday in federal court in Columbus say Paul will plead guilty Tuesday to one count of using bombs in a terrorist attack with a possible sentence of 20 years.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office declined to comment. Paul’s attorney, Jim Gilbert, says the documents speak for themselves.

The Columbus Dispatch report is more specific, saying that Paul has agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction. He could face life in prison.

UPDATE #1: Here’s a video news report by reporter Maureen Kocot courtesy of 10TV CBS News.



UPDATE #2: As a refresher to our local terrorism problem, here’s the CBN News video, “Jihad in Central Ohio” (link is to video text):