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Suspected U.S. Al-Qaeda Supporters Charged
U.S. authorities Wednesday, August 28, charged five Arab men in Detroit and a Muslim activist in the western city of Seattle, Washington, with conspiring to support Al-Qaeda. A grand jury in Detroit accused Karim Koubriti, Ahmed Hannan, Youssef Hmimssa, Farouk Ali-Haimoud and a fifth man known only as Abdella of conspiring to support Al-Qaeda and documents fraud in a four-count indictment. The men are suspected of being members of a covert âsleeperâ cell of âIslamist militantsâ who planned and scouted targets for possible terror attacks. All but Abdella are in custody.Good idea. Keep them there. The indictment claims Koubriti, 24, Hannan, 34, Ali-Haimoud,, 22, and Abdella, whose age is unknown, operated as a âcovert underground support unit for terrorist attacks within and outside the United States, as well as a sleeper operational combat cell.âThe groupâs goal was allegedly to inflict economic damage on the United States by recruiting, indoctrinating and training other âbrothersâ in their cause, setting up safe houses and mail drops; collecting intelligence information about potential targets for terror attacks and obtaining weapons and false documents to aid terror attacks in Jordan, Turkey and the United States. In other words, they were acting as spies and foreign agents. In times gone by, they'd stand them up in front of a wall and shoot them. Too bad we're too "civilized" for that now... The indictment gives no details of why Hmimssa, 37, is named along with the others. Ali-Hamoudâs lawyer, Kevin Ernst, told the Detroit Free Press newspaper said he thinks Hmimssa is cooperating with government prosecutors. âAs far as I can tell, itâs based on this uncorroborated debriefing of this snitch, Hmimssa,â Ernst said. âWhatâs kind of scary about this is that basically every Arab person in the country is one snitch away from being on the business end of a terrorism indictment.â Since he's a "snitch," anything he says shouldn't be believed? What makes him a snitch? The fact that he's cooperating with the Feds? Posted by: Fred Pruitt 2002-08-29 |
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