Islamic 'Pipeline to Extremism' Turns Out to Be Mostly FBI Set-Ups

The railroading of suspects into the justice system is reminiscent of tactics used by the FBI and prosecutors during the era of McCarthyism and COINTELPRO.

AlterNet.org
Foreign Policy in Focus / By Francis Njubi Nesbitt

December 7, 2010  |  

 

Photo Credit: cliff1066™

 

The recent rash of charges against Somali-Americans on “conspiracy to provide material support” to al-Shabaab, a Somali rebel group on the U.S. terrorism list, seems designed to send a clear message that any support for the militants will lead to criminal prosecution. It also demonstrates the ubiquitous presence of law enforcement in these communities.

The Obama administration must be careful, however, not to play into the hands of jihadists by overreacting or seeming to unfairly target Somali immigrants.

The recent arrest of Mohamed Osman Mahmoud, a 19-year-old Oregonian of Somali descent, is a case in point. Like other inept would-be terrorists who fell for recent FBI sting operations, Mahmoud was obviously incapable of pulling off any complex operation without the help of the FBI. His attempts to contact international jihadists had failed. FBI agents then contacted him, built the bomb, and provided the suspect with money to rent an apartment. His indictment states Mahmoud wanted to commit an act of terrorism since he was 15 years old. Although Mahmoud’s alleged views are deplorable, merely fantasizing about jihad is not a crime.


Radicalization

The media and policymakers argue that this is a process of “radicalization” that turns self-identified radicals into jihadists. The New York Police Department’s much-quoted 2006 analysis of radicalization, Radicalization of the West: The Homegrown Threat, argued that there are four identifiable stages (pre-radicalization, self-identification, indoctrination, jihadization) in the process of radicalization. Borrowing mainly from the European experience, the report ascribes “jihadist or jihadi-Salafi ideology” as what mainly “motivates young men and women, born or living in the West, to carry out autonomous jihad via acts of terrorism against their host countries.”

However, this assumption does not apply to all would-be militants. Some, like the Somali youth who joined al-Shabaab in 2008, may have been motivated by nationalism rather than anti-Americanism.
Analyzing the Mahmoud case in the context of the NYPD theory, the teen was only at the second stage -- self-identification. As the NYPD report indicates, there is no formula for determining who will move from “self-identification” to “jihadization.” Indeed, according to the report, both “indoctrination” and “jihadization” require close contact and support from spiritual and operational leaders. It seems, therefore, that the FBI became Mahmoud’s operational leader.

Another recent report, the American Security Project’s Enemies Among Us: Domestic Radicalization After September 11, focuses on the psychological motivations of individuals. The report uses adjectives such as ‘bewildering” and “unpredictable.” It argues that the only commonality identified is the eventual exposure of the so-called radicals to “radical Islam” at mosques, the Internet, or through friends and recruiters. “Alienation” is considered a major factor, but it is not clear why alienation turns to actual action or plans to act.

The Bipartisan Policy Center report entitled “Assessing the Terrorist Threat," released this year and timed to coincide with the 9/11 anniversary, portrays the FBI as failing to understand that these incidents were not isolated. Rather, they indicate “an embryonic terrorist radicalization and recruitment structure had been established in the U.S. homeland.” The authors argued that the FBI, and Americans in general, seem to have been lulled into a sense of complacency by polls and statistics that showed that Americans Muslims as well-off and integrated.

The media and law enforcement officials continue to refer to these cases as “terrorism,” although so far there is no record of a person of Somali descent committing an act of violent terrorism in the United States. This amorphous definition creates the impression that Somalis, in general, are a threat. In March 2009, for instance, Deputy Director of Intelligence for the National Counterterrorism Center Andrew Liepman told a Senate hearing on al-Shabaab recruitment in the United States that some Somalis were susceptible to “criminal or extremist influence” because of their background.

According to Liepman, “Among Somali-Americans, the refugee experience of fleeing a war-torn country, combined with perceived discrimination, marginalization, and frustrated expectations, as well as local criminal, familial, and clan dynamics may heighten the susceptibility of some members of these communities to criminal or extremist influences.”

At this same congressional hearing, Philip Mudd, the FBI associate executive assistant director of the National Security Branch, said that the FBI believed there were deliberate efforts to recruit young people to fight for al-Shabaab. He stated the youths seemed to be motivated by nationalism, with the desire to defend their country from an Ethiopian invasion, rather than Islamist ideology, although the appeal was based on shared Islamic identity. Mudd also indicated that socio-economic conditions such as “violent youth crime and gang subcultures, and tensions over cultural integration may have played some role in the recruitment process.”

Do these activities indicate a growing alienation and anger among the 1.5 and second generation of Somali youth growing up in the United States? The vague accusations threaten to indict thousands of otherwise law-abiding Somalis who were outraged by the Ethiopian invasion of Somalia in 2006. The majority of parents and community leaders consider the United States a place of refuge from the chaos and violence that led to their flight from Somalia. They were as surprised and dismayed as other Americans when they learned that their children had joined the jihadist movement in Somalia.


Material Support

Providing “material support or resources” -- such as money, goods, personnel, and advice that can be used in terrorist activity -- to a group designated as a “foreign terrorist organization” is illegal and carries a 15-year sentence. Congress first criminalized material support in 1996 in order to deny terrorist groups with humanitarian offshoots the ability to raise funds in the United States. After 9/11, the 2001 Patriot Act broadened it to criminalize “expert advice or assistance.” In June 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the “material support” provision to include money and materials as well as “training” and “advice” -- even if for humanitarian purposes.

In August 2010, the Justice Department indicted 14 Somali-Americans on charges of providing “material support” to al-Shabaab and allegedly recruiting youth to join the militia. Twelve of the suspects from California, Minnesota, and Alabama were indicted for leaving the United States to join al-Shabaab. Six of the suspects are U.S. citizens. Attorney General Eric Holder stated that these indictments indicate the existence of a “deadly pipeline that has routed funding and fighters from cities across the United States.”

Three months later, prosecutors in San Diego charged five Somali-Americans with providing “material support” to a foreign terrorist organization. The group allegedly sent about $9,000 to al-Shabaab between 2007 and 2008, with some of the funds possibly transferred after the United States added al-Shabaab to its terrorist list in 2008. But in 2008, al-Shabaab was an insignificant threat to the international community, having emerged to resist an Ethiopian invasion supported by the Bush administration. The defendants included such community leaders as Mohamed Mohamed Mahmood, who has served as the imam of a Somali mosque for over a decade. Some of the defendants claimed that they were collecting funds for humanitarian projects in Somalia.

Also in November, prosecutors indicted a San Diego woman for allegedly sending $800 to two former Minnesota residents fighting in Somalia. The amounts sent by the defendants are minimal considering that al-Shabaab has other more lucrative funding sources including piracy in the Gulf of Aden and supporters across the oil-rich Arabian peninsula.

The “material support:” provision of the Patriot Act is already very controversial among human rights activist interested in Latin America and Asia where it has been used to deny refugee status to individuals forced to cooperate with rebel groups. This provision of law was also used to justify a recent raid on the homes of 14 peace activists (non-Somalis) who oppose U.S. foreign policy in Latin America and Israel/Palestine. The railroading of suspects into the justice system is reminiscent of tactics used by the FBI and prosecutors during the era of McCarthyism and COINTELPRO, both of which persecuted perceived “radicals” such as Paul Robeson, W.E.B. DuBois, and Martin Luther King, Jr.


Changing Directions

These so-called counter-radicalization policies focus on individuals rather than structures, symptoms rather than root causes. A more proactive domestic approach would include policies that prevent radicalization instead of focusing on arresting and prosecuting perpetrators. The aggressive and overt policing and prosecution of marginal cases may deter some, but has the strong potential to breed anti-Muslim and anti-American sentiments at home and abroad. The retaliatory arson attack on the mosque, where the Portland bombing suspect allegedly worshipped, is but one example.

There is an urgent need to change direction by establishing “pipelines to integration” to counter the efforts to establish a pipeline to extremism. Such pipelines could include tackling poverty and unemployment by expanding English as a Second Language classes, after-school programs, job training, and citizenship programs in Somali communities. These, in turn, would engage the youth in positive alternatives to the lure of extremism, gangs, drug dealing, and prostitution. In addition, integrating Somalis into the larger community, while respecting their cultural heritage and traditions, requires cultural competency training for law enforcement personnel, teachers, and other public officials.

Somali immigrant youth, often children of immigrants themselves, are in danger of losing connection with their ethnic heritage and values. This dilemma of being neither American nor Somali leads them to search for identity and belonging that some satisfy by turning to religion, following a radical preacher, or in rare cases joining a jihadist group. The overwhelming majority of Somalis, even those who oppose U.S. policies abroad, do not join jihadist groups. For those few who do, it is the exposure to particular personal and communicative networks that turn radical thought into violent action. Trying to identify and neutralize the few youth who attempt to join al-Shabaab does not even begin to deal with the problem.

---

Francis NJubi Nesbitt is a Foreign Policy in Focus contributor. He is the author of Race for Sanctions: African Americans against Apartheid, 1946-1994 and is currently completing a book on U.S. foreign policies in the Horn of Africa.

The FBI vs. Muslims - what went wrong

M. Salahuddin Khan

San Francisco Chronicle December 9, 2010 04:00 AM Copyright San Francisco Chronicle. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Thursday, December 9, 2010

San Francisco Chronicle

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/12/08/EDGI1GNNDT.DTL#ixzz17jMndJ8O

 

The FBI is critically important to our country's war on terror - not in Afghanistan or Pakistan, but right here at home. It is tasked with finding the homegrown terrorists who mean us harm. I know a former regional director of the organization personally. He is utterly conscientious and concerned not only for America's security but also for the integrity of his venerable institution. These days, America's domestic security is very much wrapped up in its dealings with the American Muslim community. What is evident is that the Muslim community and the FBI need to develop a partnership and work toward a common goal.

But if developments in Irvine are to be believed, the FBI has been the one entrapped by its own bungled attempts to entrap supposedly "amenable" members of the Irvine Muslim community.
The affair, recently reported by the Washington Post, dates back to 2006. A convicted felon, Craig Monteilh, who was already an FBI informant, was persuaded (financially and otherwise) to spy on the local mosque's worshipers. Ultimately, Monteilh, who used the name Farouk al-Aziz, managed to get a couple of worshipers to agree to join him in bombing a mall. Unknown to al-Aziz, however, they went directly to the imam of the mosque, who reported al-Aziz to the authorities.

Stories of this nature will continue to surface from time to time amid the nationwide paranoid clamor for some kind of surveillance. They serve to illustrate the slippery slope upon which we appear to have placed ourselves. Moreover, they underscore the kind of unplanned success to which a nearly vanquished al Qaeda is still able to lay claim. Its members must surely be smirking as American society exposes hairline fractures that herald further erosions of liberty, which are antithetical to the country's fundamental values. Weakening these pillars of our democracy fulfills the most desired nihilist objectives of al Qaeda and its ilk.

A 2010 joint study by Duke University's Sanford School of Public Policy and the University of North Carolina identified the positive impact of America's mosques on tamping down tendencies for impressionable young Muslims to become radicalized. The Irvine story provides an affirming data point for this analysis and demonstrates a poverty of intelligence at the FBI. The agency failed to engage the Muslim community through its mosques to better leverage their leaders to continue the good work. Instead, not only is there a concerted effort at furtive infiltration but also a driving away of the very leaders that might have proved a valuable asset in the authorities' much-needed efforts to prevent homegrown terrorism.

What is doubly disturbing, if al-Aziz's accounts are to be believed, is that the FBI handler he worked with told him, "Islam is a threat to national security." If this is indeed more than an isolated sentiment, then it undermines government assertions of the importance of partnering with U.S. Muslim communities (who must be forgiven for responding cynically).

It would be tragic if the opportunity to work together to prevent radicalism is lost through such shortsighted attempts to entrap mosque members.

M. Salahuddin Khan is the author of "Sikander" ( www.sikanderbook.com).

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/12/08/EDGI1GNNDT.DTL#ixzz17jMTv09w

Wajahat Ali: Time for FBI to stop spying on American Muslims (The Guardian)

Time for FBI to stop spying on American Muslims
Wajahat Ali

The Guardian, 12/7/2010

The recent arrest of the potential Christmas tree bomber is reflective of the FBI's myopic strategy of using glitzy, expensive sting operations and dubious confidential informants to further erode Muslim American relations instead of concentrating on effective partnerships to combat radicalisation. The FBI is promoting the arrest of Mohamed Osman Mohamud, a 19-year-old Somali-born teenager accused of attempting to detonate a car bomb at a Christmas tree-lighting ceremony, as a triumph of effective law enforcement. Instead, the operation reeks of gratuitous self-adulation, requiring 6 months of time and precious expenditures to "uncover" a dummy terrorist plot wholly scripted and concocted by the FBI in the first place.

Although many argue that this was simply entrapment, evidence does indicate that Mohamud became increasingly radicalised and voluntarily continued with the FBI's fake terror plot. Regardless, CAIR attorney Zahra Billo told me, "The FBI seek out troubled people – nobody is arguing that some of these individuals aren't deeply troubled – and then enable and facilitate their aspirations. It is the FBI's job to stop operational terrorists. It is not the FBI's job to enable aspirational terrorists."
Attorney General Eric Holder recently suggested the use of such sting operations were "part of a forward-leaning way" in which law enforcement could proactively find those individuals committed to harming Americans, and a study revealed that 62% of terror prosecutions relied on confidential informants. But recent episodes suggest these tactics are neither "forward-looking", nor effective. Instead, they contribute towards a deepening, polarising wedge between law enforcement officials and some of their most important assets in the war against extremism: Muslim American communities.

Recently, a former FBI confidential informant, Craig Monteilh, humorously codenamed "Oracle", revealed he was paid $177,000 tax-free by the FBI to infiltrate and entrap a southern California Muslim community. The convicted forger, who went by "Farouk al-Aziz", was served with a restraining order by the mosque after he repeatedly pestered attendees with absurd conversations about engaging in violent jihad. Not to be deterred, the FBI heavily relied upon Oracle's superlative evidence, consisting of taped conversations, to indict an Afghan-American language instructor for allegedly making false statements regarding his ties to terrorists. Moreover, prosecutors alleged he was the brother-in-law of Osama bin Laden's security coordinator.

Surely, this bombshell discovery paved the way for a successful prosecution and conviction? Nearly a year and a half later, the judge agreed with the prosecutors to dismiss the case citing lack of an overseas witness and "evidentiary issues". The result is a widening distrust of the FBI, since "the community feels betrayed," said Shakeel Syed, executive director of the Islamic shura council of southern California, an umbrella group of more than 75 mosques.

In the deeply flawed 2005 Lodi terror case, the FBI boasted of capturing two, alleged high-level terrorists, Hamid and Umer Hyatt – Pakistani father and son immigrants, who drove ice cream trucks for a living – based on the evidence of an unreliable Pakistani-American informant, codenamed "Wildkat". Indeed, his fact-finding lived up to his name, since he told the FBI he saw al-Qaida's number two man, Ayman al-Zawahiri, at his Lodi, California mosque. Although the FBI [thankfully] conceded his reporting as false, they nonetheless proceeded to pay him nearly $300,000 to infiltrate the sleepy Muslim community and scour for terrorists. His taped conversations with Umer Hyatt reveal him badgering and allegedly conning Umer to make incriminating statements. Furthermore, videotapes of the Hyatts' absurd alleged "confessions", which former veteran FBI agent James Wedick Jr reviewed and concluded were a result of illegal questioning and coaxing, nonetheless convinced a jury to convict Hamid of providing material support to terrorists and making false statements to the FBI.

Aside from a miscarriage of justice, perhaps the most poisonous result of such belligerent law enforcement procedures, is a "chilling effect" on the Muslim American community, in which citizens legitimately feel fear and alienation from, and a deepening mistrust of, their government, as a result of such harassment. "Time and again, Muslims prove themselves to be good and smart when it comes to reporting potential crimes. The problem with this method of law enforcement is that strains the very relationships that are critical to effective community policing," says Billoo.

In a country where 60% of its citizens claim to not know a Muslim and 45% regard Islam as a religion that promotes violence, these self-aggrandising displays of "successful" prosecutions also contribute to the volatile climate of anti-Muslim bigotry and reactionary rhetoric. Recently, Glenn Beck delved into his hyperactive, paranoid imagination to produce the utterly baseless statistic that nearly 10% of Muslims are terrorists. Although many of Beck's audience will not question the veracity of his "facts", a comprehensive study undertaken by Duke University reveals that the number of radicalised Muslim-Americans remains very small. The study reports that "Muslim American communities have been active in preventing radicalisation… This is one reason that Muslim American terrorism has resulted in fewer than three dozen of the 136,000 murders committed in the United States since 9/11."

Thus, a Senegalese Muslim immigrant was the first to witness and report failed jihadist Faisal Shahzad's burning car in Times Square. A Muslim American community in Virginia went to local law enforcements and the FBI after discovering troubling videotapes left by five youths who allegedly went to Pakistan to commit jihad. A convert to Islam tipped off the FBI about the Christian militant group, the Hutarees, who were planning a terrorist attack on American soil. Even the Nigerian underwear bomber's own father warned British authorities that his son was radicalised and could potentially harm himself and others.

Undoubtedly, radicalisation and terrorism are real threats, which afflict all US citizens, regardless of race or religion. Perhaps the FBI should now cease treating most Muslim American citizens as potential suspects, whose privacy rights and civil liberties are now curtailed in clumsy ways – such as faulty GPS tracking devices sloppily attached on their cars. Perhaps the FBI needs to spend its considerable (taxpayer-paid-for) resources to re-engage them as partners and allies – instead of contributing to the heightened climate of fear and paranoia by employing shady informants with cheesy, comic-book codenames.

--

Wajahat Ali is a Muslim American of Pakistani descent. He is a writer and attorney, whose work, The Domestic Crusaders is the first major play about Muslims living in a post 9/11 America. He is the Associate Editor of Altmuslim.com. His blog is here

The FBI's "ACORN" Moment

Adam Serwer

12/6/2010

The American Prospect

Having offered a very qualified defense of the FBI's use of informants in some terrorism cases last week, this story from The Washington Post, about an FBI informant named Craig Monteilh who was simply ordered to infiltrate a California mosque without an actual target, reads more like one of James O'Keefe's video schemes than a terrorism investigation:

In May 2007, Monteilh said he recorded a conversation about jihad during a car ride with Niazi and another man. Monteilh said he suggested an operation to blow up buildings and Niazi agreed. An FBI agent later cited that and other taped conversations between the two in court as evidence that Niazi was a threat.
A few days later, Ayloush got an anguished phone call from Niazi and the other man in the car.
"They said Farouk had told them he had access to weapons and that they should blow up a mall,'' Ayloush recalled. "They were convinced this man was a terrorist."
Ayloush reported the FBI's own informant to the FBI. He said agents interviewed Niazi, who gave them the same account, but the agency took no action against Monteilh.

So this guy thinks he's in a car with a terrorist -- and he does the rational thing, which is pretend he's on the same page, because after all, the guy is a terrorist and might kill him -- and the FBI's response is to use this as evidence that he's willing to kill innocent people. Mentioning O'Keefe isn't a diss -- the parallels are striking -- ACORN workers filed police complaints after supposedly "playing along" on some of the videos. Niazi did what, ideally, the FBI would have wanted him to do -- and they tried to nail him anyway. Given that the government acknowledges a toxic relationship between the American Muslim community and law enforcement would be a disaster for terrorism investigations, one wonders why the FBI was busy trying to make a case against the kind of person who will drop a dime on someone they believed was a terrorist.  Prosecutors ultimately dismissed the case, but it's extraordinary that it even got as far as a courtroom.

This strikes me as a pretty clear indication of a systemic problem. According to Montieilh, "He was instructed to infiltrate mosques throughout Orange and two neighboring counties in Southern California, where the Muslim population of nearly 500,000 is the nation's largest." If that sounds like racial profiling, it is -- but the FBI's operations guide basically allows investigations into "concentrated ethnic communities" if "these locations will reasonably aid the analysis of potential threats and vulnerabilities, and, overall, assist domain awareness for the purpose of performing intelligence analysis." That's basically a license to start snooping around on people for almost any reason. This case occurred years before the Obama administration took office, but Attorney General Eric Holder kept the expanded guidelines put in place by the last administration -- it's probably time to revisit them.

Tension grows between Muslims & FBI after informant infiltrates mosque

By Jerry Markon
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, December 5, 2010; 12:47 AM

IRVINE, CALIF. - Before the sun rose, the informant donned a white Islamic robe. A tiny camera was sewn into a button, and a microphone was buried in a device attached to his keys.

"This is Farouk al-Aziz, code name Oracle," he said into the keys as he sat in his parked car in this quiet community south of Los Angeles. "It's November 13th, 4:30 a.m. And we're hot."

The undercover FBI informant - a convicted forger named Craig Monteilh - then drove off for 5 a.m. prayers at the Islamic Center of Irvine, where he says he spied on dozens of worshipers in a quest for potential terrorists.

Since the 2001 terrorist attacks, the FBI has used informants successfully as one of many tactics to prevent another strike in the United States. Agency officials say they are careful not to violate civil liberties and do not target Muslims.

But the FBI's approach has come under fire from some Muslims, criticism that surfaced again late last month after agents arrested an Oregon man they said tried to detonate a bomb at a Christmas tree-lighting ceremony. FBI technicians had supplied the device.

In the Irvine case, Monteilh's mission as an informant backfired. Muslims were so alarmed by his talk of violent jihad that they obtained a restraining order against him.

He had helped build a terrorism-related case against a mosque member, but that also collapsed. The Justice Department recently took the extraordinary step of dropping charges against the worshiper, who Monteilh had caught on tape agreeing to blow up buildings, law enforcement officials said. Prosecutors had portrayed the man as a dire threat.

Compounding the damage, Monteilh has gone public, revealing secret FBI methods and charging that his "handlers" trained him to entrap Muslims as he infiltrated their mosques, homes and businesses. He is now suing the FBI.

Officials declined to comment on specific details of Monteilh's tale but confirm that he was a paid FBI informant. Court records and interviews corroborate not only that Monteilh worked for the FBI - he says he made $177,000, tax-free, in 15 months - but that he provided vital information on a number of cases.

Some Muslims in Southern California and nationally say the cascading revelations have seriously damaged their relationship with the FBI, a partnership that both sides agree is critical to preventing attacks and homegrown terrorism.

Citing Monteilh's actions and what they call a pattern of FBI surveillance, many leading national Muslim organizations have virtually suspended contact with the bureau.

"The community feels betrayed," said Shakeel Syed, executive director of the Islamic Shura Council of Southern California, an umbrella group of more than 75 mosques.

"They got a guy, a bona fide criminal, and obviously trained him and sent him to infiltrate mosques," Syed said. "And when things went sour, they ditched him and he got mad. It's like a soap opera, for God's sake."

FBI and Justice Department officials say that the Monteilh case is not representative of their relations with the Muslim community and that they continue to work closely with Muslims in investigating violence and other hate crimes against them. Officials also credit U.S. Muslims with reporting critical information in a variety of counterterrorism cases.

The bureau "relies on the support, cooperation and trust of the communities it serves and protects," FBI spokesman Michael Kortan said, adding that agents conduct investigations "under well-defined investigative guidelines and the law, and in close coordination with the Department of Justice."

Officials said they have gone to great lengths to maintain good relationships with Muslims, including meetings hosted by Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. Last week, FBI officials met to discuss law enforcement and other issues with predominantly Muslim Somali community members in San Diego and Minneapolis.

Steven Martinez, assistant director in charge of the FBI's Los Angeles field office, declined to comment on Monteilh, citing Monteilh's lawsuit. He said that in certain circumstances, if there is evidence of a crime, FBI agents may "conduct an activity that might somehow involve surveillance in and about a mosque."

But he said the agency does not target people based on religion or ethnicity.

"I know there's a lot of suspicion that that's the focus, that we're looking at the mosques, monitoring who is coming and going. That's just not the case," he said.
The 'chameleon'

Monteilh's career as an informant began in 2003. Like many other informants, he was familiar with the inside of a prison cell. He had just finished a sentence for forging bank notes when local police officers he met at a gym asked him to infiltrate drug gangs and white supremacist groups for a federal-state task force.

"It was very exciting," Monteilh said in an interview with The Washington Post. "I had the ability to be a chameleon."

Monteilh, who stands over 6 feet tall and weighs 260 pounds, had worked as a prison chaplain before he was incarcerated. Married with three children, the Los Angeles native said that after he became an informant, an FBI agent on the task force sought him out. Law enforcement sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about informants, said Monteilh was promoted from drug and bank robbery cases because his information was reliable and had led to convictions.

In early 2006, Monteilh said, he met with his FBI handler at a Starbucks.

"She asked if I wanted to infiltrate mosques," he said. At a follow-up session at a doughnut shop, he said, his new handler told him that "Islam is a threat to our national security."

Law enforcement sources said that the FBI trained Monteilh and that he aided an existing investigation. Monteilh, however, said he was ordered to randomly surveil and spy on Muslims to ferret out potential terrorists. Agents, he said, provided his cover: Farouk al-Aziz, a French Syrian in search of his Islamic roots. His code name was "Oracle."

Monteilh said he was instructed to infiltrate mosques throughout Orange and two neighboring counties in Southern California, where the Muslim population of nearly 500,000 is the nation's largest. He was told to target the Islamic Center of Irvine, he said, because it was near his home.

FBI tactics were already a sensitive issue at the Irvine mosque, a stucco, two-story building that draws as many as 2,000 people for Friday prayers. With tensions rising between law enforcement and Muslims over allegations of FBI surveillance, J. Stephen Tidwell, then head of the FBI's Los Angeles office, spoke at the mosque in June 2006.

"If we're going to mosques to come to services, we will tell you," he said, according to a video of his speech. ". . . The FBI will tell you we're coming for the very reason that we don't want you to think you're being monitored. We would come only to learn."

Two months later, in August 2006, Monteilh arrived at the same mosque. He had called earlier and met with the imam. That Friday, he took shahada, the Muslim declaration of faith, before hundreds of worshipers.

Worshipers said that in Monteilh's 10 months at the mosque, he became almost manic in his devotion, attending prayers five times a day and waiting in the parking lot before the 5 a.m. prayer. Monteilh said he was told by the FBI to take notes on who opened the mosque each day.

Worshipers said his Western clothes gave way to an Islamic robe, a white skullcap and sandals, an outfit Monteilh said was chosen by his handlers. As he grew closer to Muslims, he said, the FBI told him to date Muslim women if it gained him intelligence.

Worshipers noticed that Monteilh often left his keys around the mosque, said Hussam Ayloush, executive director of the Los Angeles chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, who speaks often at the mosque.

"It seemed strange to people," Ayloush said.

Inside the car remote on the bundle of keys was a microphone that recorded Muslims at the mosque, in their homes and at a local gym. Monteilh, who told people he was a fitness trainer, used the gym to seek out Muslim men.

"We started hearing that he was saying weird things," said Omar Kurdi, a Loyola Law School student who knew Monteilh from the mosque and gym. "He would walk up to one of my friends and say, 'It's good that you guys are getting ready for the jihad."

Worshipers said Monteilh gravitated to Ahmadullah Sais Niazi, an Afghan-born Arabic-language instructor who was a regular at Friday prayers.

In May 2007, Monteilh said he recorded a conversation about jihad during a car ride with Niazi and another man. Monteilh said he suggested an operation to blow up buildings and Niazi agreed. An FBI agent later cited that and other taped conversations between the two in court as evidence that Niazi was a threat.

A few days later, Ayloush got an anguished phone call from Niazi and the other man in the car.

"They said Farouk had told them he had access to weapons and that they should blow up a mall,'' Ayloush recalled. "They were convinced this man was a terrorist."

Ayloush reported the FBI's own informant to the FBI. He said agents interviewed Niazi, who gave them the same account, but the agency took no action against Monteilh.

Still, Monteilh's mission was collapsing. Members of the mosque told its leaders that they were afraid of Monteilh and that he was "trying to entrap them into a mission," according to Asim Khan, the former mosque president. The mosque went to Orange County Superior Court in June 2007 and obtained a restraining order against Monteilh, court records show.

Soon afterward, Monteilh said FBI agents "told me they wanted to cut me loose." After he vowed to go public, he said, he met with three agents at the Anaheim Hilton, where an FBI supervisor threatened him with arrest.

"She said, 'If you reveal your informant status to the media, it will destroy the Muslim community's relationship with the FBI forever." Monteilh said.

The FBI declined to comment on Monteilh's allegation.

At a subsequent meeting, Monteilh said, he signed a non-disclosure agreement in exchange for $25,000 in cash. An FBI letter to Monteilh's attorney, on file in U.S. District Court in Santa Ana, says Monteilh signed the non-disclosure agreement in October 2007.

But Monteilh was arrested in December 2007 on a grand-theft charge and ended up back in jail for 16 months. In January, he sued the FBI, alleging that the bureau and Irvine police conspired to have him arrested, then allowed his informant status to become known in prison, where he was stabbed.

The FBI and police have denied the allegations, and the lawsuit was dismissed on jurisdictional grounds. But the judge allowed Monteilh to file an amended complaint, with similar allegations, in September. The case is pending.
A case unravels

In the meantime, the case against Niazi unfolded. He was indicted in February 2009 by a federal grand jury on charges of lying about his ties to terrorists on immigration documents. In court, prosecutors said that jihadist materials were found on Niazi's computer and that he had wired money to an alleged al-Qaeda financier. Prosecutors said he is the brother-in-law of Osama bin Laden's security coordinator. Much of the evidence was FBI testimony about Niazi's recorded conversations with an FBI informant, who sources say was Monteilh.

"Frankly, there is no amount of bail or equity in a home that can protect the citizens of this community" from Niazi, Assistant U.S. Attorney Deirdre Eliot said in arguing for his detention.

Within days of Niazi's indictment, Monteilh revealed his informant status in a series of interviews with Los Angeles area media.

"I think the FBI treated me with the utmost treachery," he said in the interview with The Post.

In subsequent months, Monteilh sought out Niazi's attorneys and told them he was ordered to entrap their client.

A year and a half later, on Sept. 30, prosecutors summarily moved to dismiss the case against Niazi, and a judge agreed. The U.S. attorney's office in Los Angeles cited the lack of an overseas witness and "evidentiary issues." Sources familiar with the decision said Monteilh's role - and his potential testimony for the defense - was also a factor.

Niazi declined to comment. His attorney Chase Scolnick said he is "very pleased with the outcome. It is a just result."

In recent weeks, Monteilh said, he has been approaching Muslims at a local gym and apologizing for "disrespecting their community and religion." Monteilh, who is now unemployed, says he regrets his role in the Niazi case and was glad when the charges were dropped.

On a recent Friday, more than 200 men sat on the carpet for prayers inside the Irvine mosque, most of them in khakis or jeans. During the sermon, the imam offered some advice.

"If an FBI agent comes in and says, 'You're under arrest,'â??" he told the crowd, they should pray to Allah - and then call a lawyer.

As worshipers milled around outside, they said they support the FBI's role in fighting terrorism but feel betrayed by the infiltration of their sacred place.

"The FBI wants to treat the Muslim community as a partner while investigating us behind our backs,'' said Kurdi, the Loyola student. "They can't have it both ways."

Staff researcher Julie Tate contributed to this report.

Mosque shuns FBI informant

Aljazeera
12/5/2010

An FBI informant who attempted to infiltrate an Islamic community centre in the quiet Californian town of Irvine scared Muslim worshippers so much with his talk of violent jihad that they took out order against him, the Washington Post reported.

The FBI claims its use of such informants has prevented more attacks since the attacks of September 11, 2001.

Yet its officials have said that they do not target Muslims - an argument that has long been taken with a dose of scepticism by some commentators.
 
The latest case follows revelations that a man who tried to bomb a Christmas ceremony in Portland, Oregon, did so not only whilst under FBI surveillance, but had been provided with fake explosives by its undercover agents.

Making matters worse for the agency, Craig Monteilh, the convicted fraudster whom the FBI sent into the mosque to spy on its members, has gone public and is suing the investigative agency.

The two cases are reviving criticisms over the government agency's apparent surveillance of Muslims in the US.

Southern Californian Muslim community leaders have expressed outrage over the FBI's methods, saying it undermines any efforts to build trust.

"The community feels betrayed," Shakeel Syed, the executive director of the Islamic Shura Council of Southern California, told the Post.

"They got a guy, a bona fide criminal, and obviously trained him and sent him to infiltrate mosques," Syed was quoted as saying. "And when things went sour, they ditched him and he got mad. It's like a soap opera, for God's sake."

Informant files $10 million suit against FBI

By SALVADOR HERNANDEZ
Orange County Register

1/22/2010

A man who once worked with the FBI, allegedly feeding the agency information on local mosques and Muslim communities throughout the county, has today filed a $10 million civil liberties lawsuit against the federal agency.

The suit goes into detail on work that Craig Monteilh, a convicted felon, alleges he did for the FBI while working with the Orange County Joint Terrorism Task force – much of which has been widely reported by the media since Monteilh went public with his claims in 2009. The lawsuit says Monteilh was encouraged to lie to investigators with the Irvine Police Department regarding a criminal investigation alleged to be part of an FBI drug sting operation.

After he was convicted in 2008 on charges of grand theft related to the distribution of steroids, the lawsuit says that the FBI turned its back on Monteilh – after he was identified as a snitch inside Central Men's Jail and Wasco State Prison.

"Mr. Monteilh communicated his grave concerns over the threats on his life to the FBI and asked for the FBI to arrange for protective custody, but instead he was left in general population, thereby exposed to constant danger of being killed," the suit reads.

According to the suit, on April 27, 2008 Monteilh was attacked and stabbed by a member of a white supremacist gang inside Wasco State Prison, after several criminal gangs had placed "hits" on him.

"Mr. Monteilh continues to live in fear for his life and with the mental and physical scars," according to the suit.

Officials at the FBI declined to speak about the lawsuit, citing department policy, but addressed some of the details in Monteilh's claims, saying in a written statement that, "the accusations appear to be an attempt by Mr. Monteilh to discredit law enforcement for personal gain, at the expense of the Muslim-American community."

The 2007 grand theft arrest, which Monteilh claims was done under the direction of FBI agents, was not part of any investigation conducted by the FBI, said Laura Eimiller, spokeswoman for the department.


GOING PUBLIC

The lawsuit, filed in US District Court, names not only the agency but singles out the head of Assistant Special Agent in Charge of the FBI's Santa Ana office Barbara Walls, as well as Ron Carr, an investigator with the Irvine Police Department.

The suit alleges that Monteilh had provided agents with information about bomb-making materials being stored in a mosque, but that Walls did not act on the information for three weeks.

"Walls was embarrassed and instead of accepting responsibility for her error in judgment, called Mr. Monteilh a liar," reads the lawsuit.

According to the suit, "Walls determined she would remove Mr. Monteilh from the FBI Counterterrorism program and thereafter began to conspire with Detective Ron Carr (...) to set Mr. Monteilh up for felony prosecution and conviction."

A law enforcement official familiar with the case but asked not to be identified because they are not allowed to speak publicly about the case said that although Monteilh had provided information regarding "suspicious barrels" in a local mosque, the information was thoroughly investigated and, "no evidence was found indicating a threat from explosives."

In 2009, Monteilh filed a claim for the same amount against the FBI. In December, the claim was denied by the agency.


'OPERATION FLEX'

The FBI has neither confirmed nor denied his assertions publicly, but according to court records unsealed in December, prosecutors in Los Angeles asked to terminate his probation early at the request of the FBI because Monteilh had provided "very valuable information" in a federal prosecution.

His claims were also partially substantiated in February 2009, when an FBI agent in court said an informant had recorded a Tustin man making jihadist remarks. That man, Ahmoudullah Niazi, is facing several immigration fraud charges. Monteilh claims he was the informant who recorded Niazi.

The lawsuit goes into detail about the operation Monteilh said he participated in, details which have not been reported before.

Named "Operation Flex," Monteilh was told to take on the name Farouk-al-Aziz, but was given a code name, "Oracle," according to the suit.

"Assistant United States Attorney Dierdra Eliot gave Mr. Monteilh special permission, by and through a signed Federal document, to engage in jihadist rhetoric, including but not limited to conducting terrorist operations, possessing weapons and initiating conversations to further terrorist acts against the United States," the lawsuit states.

Eliot did not immediately return calls for comment, but Eimiller said the agency does not encourage informants, verbally or in writing, to engage in terrorist rhetoric or operations.


COMMUNITY REACTION

But such claims echo those that have been made by Muslim organizations across the country, whose leaders have said that informants planted within their communities have not weeded out violent extremists, but instead have been the very ones to push violent agendas and conversations in their communities.

Hussam Ayloush, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Los Angeles Chapter, said it's not the use of informants that worries him, but allegations and consistent reports that informants incite violent rhetoric inside the Muslim community, and reports that agents use immigration, financial, and legal tactics to strong-arm people into becoming informants.

"We should all be informants," Ayloush said, stating that everyone in the country should report suspicious activities to law enforcement. "But they are acting like agent provocateurs."

Ayloush said it was concerning how many resources the FBI was spending on "fishing" instead of focusing efforts on legitimate leads.

Although the FBI has not commented directly on Monteilh's alleged role as an informant, or the work he says he did at the direction of FBI agents, the bureau has repeatedly issued statements denying that it racially profiles, and that agents conduct investigations only where leads take them.

Ayloush said he is not convinced, and that a vital tie between the Muslim community and the FBI remains strained.


© Copyright 2010 Freedom Communications. All Rights Reserved.

Greenhut: First, Muslims; next, maybe you

Column written by Steven Greenhut
Sr. editorial writer and columnist
The Orange County Register
Sunday, May 31, 2009
sgreenhut@ocregister.com


Government officials seek to control whatever it is they don't understand. In my experience, they don't understand much, so they try to regulate, tax, monitor and control everything. And now we learn that the Obama administration, clueless about the nature of conservative activism in this country, wants to monitor it very carefully. According to a Department of Homeland Security report released in April, Americans who are active in fighting abortion, same-sex marriage, illegal immigration and gun control, and who prefer state or local authority to federal authority, are potential right-wing extremists who demand closer attention from law enforcement.

"The possible passage of new restrictions on firearms and the return of military veterans facing significant challenges reintegrating into their communities could lead to the potential emergence of terrorist groups or lone wolf extremists capable of carrying out violent attacks," the federal report stated. Although it admits that there are no particular incidents of such extremism, the agency warns that the bad economy and the election of the first African-American president have created a "fertile recruiting environment for right-wing extremists."

The administration backed away from such hysteria in reaction to the backlash over the report, but the report gives insight into the thinking at the highest levels of government. Such government overreach has consequences. I got to know one family that collected military surplus items on its property in the high desert. After the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995, heightened concern about militias gave the authorities the pretext to use eminent domain to take their land. It's a long and convoluted story, but these folks had to spend years fighting to save their home and family after the authorities got an unsubstantiated and wrong notion about them.

My point: When powerful agencies get paranoid, individual Americans suffer losses of life and liberty.

At this point, right-wingers are no doubt applauding my words. But I wonder where they were during the Bush administration, as it used the terrorism threat to expand federal powers and undermine civil liberties. Actually, I don't wonder where they were. They were right there, cheering and defending the administration, just as the left-wingers are reliably defending the Obama administration as it seeks to depict decent people as threats to society.

Regarding Obama's outrageous report, conservative columnist Michele Malkin wrote: "[T]he piece of crap report issued on April 7 is a sweeping indictment of conservatives. And the intent is clear. … In Obama land, there are no coincidences. It is no coincidence that this report echoes Tea Party-bashing left-wing blogs … and demonizes the very Americans" who protested last month during the nationwide Tax Day Tea Party. She's right, but Malkin is known in part for her book defending the U.S. government's internment of innocent Japanese nationals and Japanese-Americans during World War II, and she has been quite vocal in her defense of federal policies targeting Muslim Americans.

In Orange County, the FBI used a convicted con artist as an informant who inserted himself into local mosques and recorded conversations with mosque-goers about potentially blowing up buildings. Although the agency wouldn't confirm the man's identity, it did acknowledge that he was recording people within mosques. A man named Craig Monteilh says he was the informant and he says he went by the name Farouk al-Aziz. As the Register reported, Monteilh is accused of going from one young Muslim to another, trying to engage them in radical talk. Some mosque-goers contacted the FBI to report on this seeming radical in their midst, but according to the local Council of American-Islamic Relations, these men who made complaints then became the subject of FBI scrutiny.

It's one thing for the FBI to infiltrate a mosque after getting a solid tip that someone there is involved in terrorist activities, and quite another for the agency to go on a fishing expedition. A Register editorial made this point: "Everyone understands the need for legitimate undercover activities in response to credible evidence. But we cannot fathom the justification for fishing expeditions and entrapment. Nationwide, some of the supposed terrorist 'plots' the FBI has claimed to have foiled have simply been cases of entrapment involving Muslims without the intent or wherewithal to pull off any attacks."

Even if the FBI's claims are right that it doesn't bait people into violent discussions, this infiltration business poses enormous privacy problems.

A person goes to worship at his mosque and has to worry that the people he talks to are actually recording conversations on behalf of powerful federal law enforcement agencies. No wonder many local Muslims avoided attendance there. Others have correctly argued that it would be a mistake for Muslims to cooperate with an FBI that assumes they are terrorists and secretly records their conversations. This strikes me as an authoritarian and counterproductive policy. Yet after the Register editorial, I received e-mails from conservatives blasting us for undermining the government's "war on terror" and siding with an organization (CAIR) these conservatives don't like.

So now let's turn things around. Let's say conservatives find that the Obama FBI is taping them at their churches and infiltrating pro-life, gun-rights and anti-illegal-immigration groups. We know the feds now believe that members of these groups are likely to be right-wing extremists, so the next step to "protect" the homeland from Oklahoma City-style violence is to do to these conservatives what the FBI has been doing to Muslims. Obviously, such a thing would be an outrage.

How would a conservative feel if his Bible-study friend, who once tried to goad him into violent talk about the end times, was actually a plant from the FBI? How would any of us feel if the FBI were scrutinizing sermons, recording speakers at political events and casting a wide net to "take down" the local gun club or pro-life group? Not too good, right?

Not surprisingly, the Muslim groups haven't uttered a peep about the "right-wing extremism" report, and liberal groups were busy defending the Obama administration and cheering its assault on legitimate conservative activism. No one complains when it's the other guy's ox being gored.

Isn't it time Americans defend everyone's civil liberties, not just the liberties of those on our side of the political spectrum? Can't we all realize that an excessively large and powerful federal government is a threat to everyone's liberties? Can't we unite at least in keeping a check on all federal law enforcement abuses, whether by Republican or Democratic administrations? Isn't it time for a broader alliance to protect civil liberties rather than the same tired partisanship?

Of course, my cynicism toward the feds and distrust of government authority no doubt makes me an extremist in the Obama administration's worldview. Maybe I better watch whom I talk to.

Contact the writer: sgreenhut@ocregister.com or 714-796-7823

CAIR Questions FBI Tactics in NY Synagogue ‘Plot’

New details of informant’s actions prompt Muslim group’s concerns

(WASHINGTON, D.C., 5/26/2009) ­ A prominent national Islamic civil rights and advocacy group today questioned the FBI’s tactics leading up to the arrest of four New York men for allegedly plotting to attack Jewish institutions in that state.

Based on early reports of a foiled plot to bomb a synagogue and a Jewish community center and to shoot down military planes, the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) initially applauded the FBI and the other law enforcement agencies that took part in the investigation.

In a statement issued today, CAIR cited newly-revealed details of the case that indicate the alleged “plot” may have been based more on the financial inducements of a government informant than on the predisposition to terrorism of three petty criminals and a mentally ill Haitian immigrant. The Associated Press described the alleged plotters as “down-and-out ex-convicts living on the margins in a faded industrial city.”

SEE: Islam Not to Blame for Bronx Terror Plot (Huffington Post)

“This entire scheme seems to be the product of sending yet another FBI agent provocateur into an American mosque to instigate a ‘plot’ that would likely never have been hatched but for the rhetorical and financial inducements of the government informant. As a defense attorney said of the informant in this case, who was also the informant in a previous case, ‘Where he goes conspiracies blossom.’ According to the family of one of the suspects, the FBI informant even promised to pay for a liver transplant for his dying brother.

“We need to know who first suggested the specific targets in this plot and, if it was the FBI informant, why a government agency would create a scenario that may drive a wedge between two American religious minorities.

“These arrests seem to be based on a government formula for announcing law enforcement ‘victories’ that we have seen all too often in the past - take a paid informant, insert him into a mosque or community without probable cause of criminal behavior, locate marginal characters open to financial or rhetorical inducements, facilitate criminal actions suggested by the provocateur, and then announce ‘terror’ arrests with great fanfare.

“This formula, which could be used in any faith community, produces flashy arrests but rests on shaky constitutional ground and does little to advance legitimate law enforcement goals. It also serves to alienate an entire religious minority and provides fodder for those who seek to demonize Islam and marginalize American Muslims.”

SEE: Terrorism Arrests: Snitch, Sting, then Controversy (AP)

CAIR’s statement reiterated the American Muslim community’s longstanding repudiation of terrorism in all its forms and encouraged anyone who is aware of criminal activity to immediately contact law enforcement authorities.

SEE: Muslim Organizations Condemn Terror Plan: Is Anyone Listening?
SEE ALSO: CAIR’s Anti-Terrorism Campaigns

The statement also restated CAIR’s concerns about Justice Department guidelines, implemented under the Bush administration, which allow race and ethnicity to be factors in opening an FBI probe.

In an interview with the New York Post, the girlfriend of the alleged ringleader said the informant was constantly around, “It was like he was stalking him." The girlfriend of one of the other alleged plotters said: "They aren't radicals they were just financially motivated. They aren't terrorists. If [the informant] wasn't in the picture they would've never come up with this idea. This was not their idea. They make it sound like they sought him out and said we want to do this when he's the one who approached them. He enticed them with money.”

The New York Times wrote: “Everyone called the stranger with all the money ‘Maqsood.’ He would sit in his Mercedes, waiting in the parking lot of the mosque in Newburgh, N.Y., until the Friday prayer was over. Then, according to members of the mosque, the Masjid al-Ikhlas, he approached the young men.”

A lawyer who represented the last terror suspect tried in New York state called the FBI’s operation “a foolish waste of time and money.” He said, “It is almost as if the FBI cooked up the plot and found four idiots to install as defendants.”

SEE: FBI ‘Lured Dimwits’ Into Terror Plot (The Times)
SEE ALSO: Yet Another Bogus 'Terror' Plot (The Nation)

CAIR noted that the FBI informant in a similar case in California recently stated that he views Islam as a threat to national security.

SEE: FBI Spy: "Islam Itself is a Threat to National Security"

In March, a coalition of major national Islamic organizations announced that it is considering suspending outreach relations with the FBI, citing similar incidents in which American mosques and Muslim groups have been targeted. The American Muslim Taskforce on Civil Rights and Elections (AMT) also called on the FBI to reassess the use of informants as agents provocateurs within the Muslim community.

"Jihad Girlfriends": FBI snitch used gifts to trick our men

By LORENA MONGELLI IN NEWBURGH, NY and LUKAS I. ALPERT IN NYC
May 23, 2009
New York Post

A slick FBI informant roped four Muslim converts into a horrific terror plot to blow up synagogues and military jets by handing them piles of cash and gifts and even bags of weed, relatives of the suspects said today...

Co-conspirator David Williams's girlfriend Cassandra McKoy insists the men were duped into the plot with the lure of a cash payday and that religious hatred had nothing to do with it.

"They aren't radicals they were just financially motivated. They aren't terrorists. If Maqsood wasn't in the picture they would've never come up with this idea," she said. "This was not their idea. They make it sound like they sought him out and said we want to do this when he's the one who approached them. He enticed them with money.

"Maqsood wasn't even allowed inside the mosque, he waited in the parking lot for them and offered them $25,000 to join."

Sources say Maqsood was really Shahed Hussain -- a Pakistani native who runs hotels upstate and has worked for the FBI since 2003 after getting into trouble in a fraud case. He played an integral role in unraveling another terror-related case in Albany in 2004.

Baynes, 42, dated Cromitie -- a career criminal who has been in jail more than 20 times -- for six years. She said he converted to Islam during his last prison stint but wasn't serious.

"James is a wannabe Muslim. He wasn't real Muslin. He never prayed," she said.

But during the course of the year, Maqsood kept trying to steer Cromitie down a path to jihad - giving him religious pamphlets, clothing and prayer rugs. In the end, it seemed that cash and gifts worked better...

"Maqsood gave him a lot of marijuana," she said...

Read full article

FBI ‘lured dimwits’ into terror plot

Tony Allen-Mills, New York
May 24, 2009
The Times (UK)

On the steps of New York city hall on Friday, Michael Bloomberg, the mayor, praised the police officers and federal agents who helped disrupt an apparent terrorist plot to blow up a synagogue and shoot down military aircraft.

The mayor was flanked by more than 100 homeland security and counter-terrorist specialists, all of whom had a hand in an elaborate sting that netted four alleged Muslim extremists. Their plan, according to FBI agents, was to detonate a “fireball that would make the country gasp”...

Yet not every New Yorker was impressed by the latest in a long line of purported anti-terrorist triumphs that have supposedly averted tragedy in New York, Chicago, Toronto and several other North American cities since September 11, 2001.

“This whole operation was a foolish waste of time and money,” claimed Terence Kindlon, a defence lawyer who represented the last terror suspect to be tried in New York state. “It is almost as if the FBI cooked up the plot and found four idiots to install as defendants.”

Kindlon’s complaints were echoed by other legal experts who have repeatedly questioned the FBI’s reliance on undercover informants – known as confidential witnesses (CWs) – who lure gullible radicals into far-fetched plots that are then foiled by the agents monitoring them...

The other question that US security experts were debating was how much had been achieved by assigning more than 100 agents to a year-long investigation of three petty criminals and a mentally ill Haitian immigrant, none of whom had any connection with any known terrorist group. “They were all unsophisticated dimwits,” said Kindlon...

This unlikely crew was said to have planned to use remotely detonated C4 explosives to bomb synagogues in the New York suburb of Riverdale; they then intended to drive north to a National Guard base near Newburgh to shoot down military aircraft with a Stinger missile supplied by a man they believed was working with Jaish-e-Mohammed, a Pakistan-based terrorist group.

That man is now understood to have been Shahed Hussain, a former New York state motel owner who became an FBI informant in 2002 to avoid deportation to Pakistan after being arrested on fraud charges. Hussain appears to have met Cromitie at a Newburgh mosque where the plot to bomb Jewish targets was hatched...

The FBI is known to have infiltrated mosques, and many anti-terrorist experts believe a mosque is the last place a serious Islamic terrorist would plot an attack. “Anyone with any smarts knew to stay away from [Hussain],” said Muhammad. Yet nobody will accuse Cromitie and his cohorts of being smart.

Read full article

Yet Another Bogus 'Terror' Plot

by Robert Dreyfuss
05/22/2009
The Nation

By the now, it's maddeningly familiar. A scary terrorist plot is announced. Then it's revealed that the suspects are a hapless bunch of ne'er-do-wells or run-of-the-mill thugs without the slightest connection to any terrorists at all, never mind to Al Qaeda. Finally, the last piece of the puzzle: the entire plot is revealed to have been cooked up by a scummy government agent-provocateur.

I've seen this movie before.

In this case, the alleged perps -- Onta Williams, James Cromitie, David Williams, and Laguerre Payen -- were losers, ex-cons, drug addicts. Al Qaeda they're not. Without the assistance of the agent who entrapped them, they would never have dreamed of committing political violence, nor would they have had the slightest idea about where to acquire plastic explosives or a Stinger missile. That didn't stop prosecutors from acting as if they'd captured Osama bin Laden himself. Noted the Los Angeles Times:

Prosecutors called it the latest in a string of homegrown terrorism plots hatched after Sept. 11.

"It's hard to envision a more chilling plot," Assistant U.S. Atty. Eric Snyder said in court Thursday. He described all four suspects as "eager to bring death to Jews."

Actually, it's hard to imagine a stupider, less competent, and less important plot. The four losers were ensnared by a creepy FBI agent who hung around the mosque in upstate New York until he found what he was looking for. Here's the New York Times account:

Salahuddin Mustafa Muhammad, the imam at the mosque where the authorities say the confidential informant first encountered the men, said none of the men were active in the mosque. ...

Mr. Cromitie was there last June, and he met a stranger.

He had no way of knowing that the stranger's path to the mosque began in 2002, when he was arrested on federal charges of identity theft. He was sentenced to five years' probation, and became a confidential informant for the F.B.I. He began showing up at the mosque in Newburgh around 2007, Mr. Muhammad said.

The stranger's behavior aroused the imam's suspicions. He invited other worshipers to meals, and spoke of violence and jihad, so the imam said he steered clear of him...

So a creepy thug buttonholes people at a mosque, foaming at the mouth about violence and jihad? This is law enforcement? Just imagine if someone did this at a local church, or some synagogue. And the imam says the people "believed he was a government agent."

Preying on these losers, none of whom were apparently actual Muslims, the "confidential informant" orchestrated the acquisition of a disabled Stinger missile to shoot down military planes and cooked up a wild scheme about attacking a Jewish center in the Bronx.

It gets even more pathetic:

The only one of the four suspects who appears to have aroused any suspicion was Payen, a Haitian native who attended the Newburgh mosque. Assistant imam Hamid Rashada said his dishevelment and odd behavior disturbed some members, said the assistant imam, Hamid Rashada.

When Payen appeared in court, defense attorney Marilyn Reader described him as "intellectually challenged" and on medication for schizophrenia. The Associated Press said that when he was asked if he understood the proceedings, Payen replied: "Sort of."

Despite the pompous statements from Mayor Bloomberg of New York and other politicians, including Representative Peter King, the whole story is bogus. The four losers may have been inclined to violence, and they may have harbored a virulent strain of anti-Semitism. But it seems that the informant whipped up their violent tendencies and their hatred of Jews, cooked up the plot, incited them, arranged their purchase of weapons, and then had them busted. To ensure that it made headlines, the creepy informant claimed to be representing a Pakistani extremist group, Jaish-e Muhammad, a bona fide terrorist organization. He wasn't, of course.

It is disgusting and outrageous that the FBI is sending provocateurs into mosques.

The headlines reinforce the very fear that Dick Cheney is trying to stir up. The story strengthens the narrative that the "homeland" is under attack. It's not. As I've written repeatedly, since 9/11 not a single American has even been punched in the nose by an angry Muslim, as far as I can tell. Plot after plot -- the destruction of the Brooklyn Bridge! bombing the New York Subways! taking down the Sears Tower! bombing the Prudential building in Newark! -- proved to be utter nonsense.

Read whole article

Muslims (& FBI) need not apply!

Today, I came across a website for an Idaho Militia. I guess everything is changing, including militias.

Idaho Citizens' Constitutional Militia is not like the other chaotic and "sloppy" militias. This one is a very "professional" one.

It clearly states:

Understand that this militia will be as professional, well trained, disciplined, physically fit, and proficient as any U.S. military unit...

There are many militias across America that are undisciplined, have sloppy attire, and contribute to a continuing negative image of the militia in the minds of many Americans. This will not be one of them. I seek to recruit only those who are seriously minded about forging a formidable civil defense force and will accept nothing less than the same excellence required of our members of the armed forces.

Good to know that this militia cares about discipline.

Not only that, in the eligibility section, it makes it clear that it is an open-minded and progressive militia. I guess, gone are those days when people associated militias with racism, anti-Semitism, bigotry, and paranoia. The Idaho Citizens' Constitutional Militia almost convinced me that today's militias are more like an upgraded boy scout club. Read for yourself:

Welcome. 1. All ages. Physical requirements will be age adjusted. It's my philosophy that children should be introduced into the Militia as soon as possible. All members under 18 must have written permission from a parent or guardian. All members under 16 must be accompanied by that parent or guardian at all times. Minors will not be considered for rank.

What an amazing sense of responsibility. This is every parents' dream; a place where our kids can learn about honor and discipline.

2. Male and Female. I strongly encourage women to participate...Women serve in other state militias and do so with honor, dignity, and competence. I expect my male and female soldiers to conduct themselves professionally.

Yes, honor and dignity. Where else can one go and be reminded about such important values? And who is better than the militias to set the example for us?

3. All races. Your commander is Hawaiian, and you will be serving with blacks, hispanics, asians, whites, and all other races and backgrounds.

And all those years, people falsely accused so many militias of being racist. I am telling you, people are just so unfair sometimes.

I will not tolerate the infiltration of hateful ideologies. I understand that many from Christian Identity and Aryan nations will seek to join because of shared values when it comes to individual liberty.

You heard it from the militia. There is zero-tolerance for hate. This is a progressive, enlightened, and self-respectful association.

If you are mature and can show restraint in dealing with Jews and other ethnicities, you are welcome and encouraged to join.

What? Restraint? Restraint from doing what exactly? What kind of people are you anticipating joining the militia? This must have been a typo from the old and unrevised eligibility rules. Look at the positive side, at least now they are calling for restraint toward "Jews and other ethnicities." So racism is all behind us now. Right? Wait, it says:

Muslims, atheists, Wiccans etc need not apply. The Militia has always maintained a common faith in God (not allah or anyone else).

Oh no. My community can not join! (Someone needs to explain to them that Allah is God's name in Arabic, as used by Arab Christians, Jews, and Muslims alike. I guess intelligence must not be a requirement for eligibility)
There must be some misunderstanding here. Let me check under the "Not Welcome" section in the eligibility page.

NOT WELCOME:

1. Federal agents or persons with ties to federal agencies. This includes U.S. Marshalls, FBI, BATFE, CIA, NSA, or any SWAT members affilitated (sic) with federal agencies. This is a state militia defending the interests of Idaho and you are not welcome here.

Not to worry, several of those agencies are too busy to have time to join the militias anyway. If everyone joins the militias, then who would be torturing detainees, assassinating foreign leaders, overthrowing unfriendly governments, engaging in religious profiling, harassing American Muslims, spying on young Muslim males at gyms, or monitoring American mosques?

2. Current U.S. military members. (To clarify) *Any current active service, reserve, or guard members will be (like everyone else) required to swear an oath of allegience (sic) to the state of Idaho and its people above all other allegiences. Unless you are ready to side with the citizens of Idaho should a conflict arise between us and the federal government, you should not apply. If your first allegience is to Idaho, then you are welcome to join.

Conflict with the federal government? What conflict? Wouldn't that be terrorism?

3. Members or affiliates of the United Nations. This Militia is actively opposed to the presence and influence of the United Nations in the United States and will resist UN attempts to compromise US sovereinty using all measures up to and including force of arms. If you have ties to the UN, you are not welcome here.

OK, now they are starting to sound really paranoid.

4. Felons and all others lawfully prohibited from possessing a firearm. This applies unless by court order, the prohibition of firearms possession has been rescinded.

Like any group, this one has moral standards that it abides by. It is important to protect the militia from those who bring a bad reputation to the group. After all, an upstanding moral reputation is obviously very important to the militia membership. The funny thing is that the militia has a stricter recruiting requirement than the FBI. While the militias do not welcome felons, the FBI has frequently hired the services of convicted felons, such as Craig Monteilh.

5. Muslims. It is the opinion of the Militia that there is a world wide effort on the part of Islam to populate Western nations and, when numbers are sufficient enough, declare Sh'ria law. Islam is not a religion that accomodates (sic) other faiths or shares western values concerning freedom of religion. For that reason, we must reciprocate by declining your membership.

Now I am really hurt and offended. Ok, Ok, not that I really had any interest in joining a militia, but I don't like to be blatantly excluded. So now we officially are the only religion or population segment to be openly discriminated against. And by whom? The militia? That really hurts. And based on what? On some idiotic Islamophobic ignorant belief that Muslims are planning to take over the "Western nations". Yeah, if we are so organized, then how come we can not even agree on when to start and end the fasting month of Ramadan? But wait, there is hope. The rule adds:

If you are a Muslim but feel strongly that my reasons don't describe your temperment (sic), then email me and I'll consider your case.

I knew there are exceptions.
Let me see, they need a Muslim who, like them, holds radical views, hates the the U.N. and U.S. government, loves wearing military uniforms, enjoys carrying and using weapons, thrives on worldwide conspiracy theories and paranoia, trains to hide in mountains and caves, ... That sure is a tough one, but it is not a hopeless case. I can think of a few candidates.

I would pay money to be able to watch the reaction on the faces of the militiamen as their new Muslim member introduces himself to them: "Hello, my name is Osama Bin Laden and with me are my Al-Qaeda brothers".

The full story on the FBI's agent provocateur, Craig Monteilh

The FBI, the Islamic Center of Irvine and Craig Monteilh: Who Was Conning Whom?

By NICK SCHOU

Orange County Weekly

Published on April 29, 2009

Who Was that Mosqued Man?
Craig Monteilh insists he was hot on the trail of terrorist plots at OC mosques. Count the victims of his earlier con games among the skeptics

http://www.ocweekly.com/2009-04-30/news/craig-monteilh/

Some influential Muslim groups question FBI's actions

From the Los Angeles Times

Revelations that the agency has been surveilling popular leaders and infiltrating mosques and schools has many organizations turning away from their post-9/11 cooperation.

By Paloma Esquivel
April 20, 2009

As they sipped tea and nibbled on dates, more than 100 men and women listened to a litany of speakers sounding the same message: The FBI is not your friend.

"We're here today to say our mosques are off limits," Hussam Ayloush, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations for Greater Los Angeles, told the crowd last month at an Anaheim mosque.

"Our Koran is off limits," Ayloush said. "Our youth, who they try to radicalize, are off limits. Now is the time to tell them, 'We're not going to let this happen anymore.' "

Such strong words from a man who once was a vocal advocate of ties with federal law enforcement was yet one more signal that the fragile relationship between Muslim American groups and the FBI is being tested.

In the months and years after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, FBI officials met privately with Muslim leaders, assuring them that a spate of hate crimes would be vigorously investigated and at the same time asking for help in the campaign against terrorism. Local leaders promised to encourage cooperation.

But even as relations warmed, a series of revelations -- including allegations that the FBI sent an informant into a mosque in Orange County, surveilled community leaders and sent an agent to UC Irvine -- caused some to begin questioning the FBI's real intentions.

Now, the leaders of several Muslim organizations say they feel betrayed. Because Orange County has been at the center of many of the revelations, local leaders have taken a lead in challenging the FBI, but the issues are resonating nationwide.

On Sunday, a coalition of the nation's largest Muslim organizations, including the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the Muslim Public Affairs Council and the Islamic Society of North America, issued a statement demanding that the Obama administration address FBI actions, including what they describe as the "infiltration of mosques," the use of "agent provocateurs to trap unsuspecting Muslim youth" and the "deliberate vilification" of the council.

"It reached a level where we felt we had to do something," said Agha Saeed, chairman of the American Muslim Taskforce on Civil Rights and Elections. "The FBI is doing things which are not healthy. They are creating divisions and conflict, creating a totally negative, Islamophobic image of Muslims in America."

Over the years, there's been a gradual erosion of trust between the groups and the FBI. Months ago, the agency told local leaders it was suspending relations with the council, one of the largest Muslim civil rights groups in the country.

Since then, things have unraveled rapidly. Like other Muslim communities in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, many in Orange County -- home to more than 100,000 Muslim Americans, dozens of mosques and several prominent Muslim community organizations -- worried about FBI investigations.

The FBI, in turn, believed terrorists were either trying to get to Southern California to carry out attacks or were already here. To gain intelligence and demystify the agency's operations, the FBI met with local leaders and formed a committee that met monthly.

"In the post-9/11 world, the Arab American and Muslim community became one of those places where we said, 'It's worth making the extra effort,' " said FBI spokesman John Miller, who is also in charge of the agency's national community outreach program.

Early on, Ayloush said the FBI was acting in good faith and working with the community as "partners rather than suspects."

But the delicate relationship soon began to fray.

In 2004, the FBI and immigration officials arrested the popular head of an Anaheim mosque; he was held on immigration-related charges for two years until a judge ordered his release pending deportation. In 2006, an FBI agent was quoted as telling a business group in Newport Beach that the agency was monitoring Muslims at local universities. A year later, UC Irvine students said an FBI agent conducting an investigation at the school assaulted a Muslim student with his car near the site of a demonstration.

On a national level, there was the disclosure that FBI agents had been secretly monitoring radiation levels at mosques in search of radioactive bombs. More troubling were news reports that Muslims had been asked to become informants or face deportation.

The breaking point came in February with the revelation that the FBI had sent an informant to an Irvine mosque to collect evidence of jihadist rhetoric and other allegedly extremist acts by a Tustin man who attended prayers there.

To some, the incidents added up to this conclusion: The government was targeting all Muslims. Miller strongly disputes that contention, saying that the agency does not go on "fishing expeditions."

"What we investigate is people," he said. "If we develop information on a person, that investigation may take us different places -- to their home, their place of business . . . and yes, if . . . they go to a mosque, the investigation may take us to the mosque. That is part of what we do."

The Council on American-Islamic Relations was named in 2007, along with hundreds of other organizations and individuals, as an unindicted co-conspirator in a case against the Texas-based Holy Land Foundation, which the government accused of funneling money to terrorists.

As a result, the FBI suspended relations with the council this year.

"That is not to suggest that anyone or everyone associated with CAIR has any kind of taint," Miller said, adding that "there are some issues we would like to know more about from the leaders at CAIR's headquarters."

But at the recent meeting at the Anaheim mosque, the tone was one of frustration and anger.

Speakers suggested that ordinary Muslim Americans need to protect themselves from overzealous FBI agents.

"You don't get brownie points for speaking to them," said Ameena Qazi, a lawyer for the council. "They don't go back to the office and check off your civic engagement or your patriotism. . . . We are a very open and hospitable community, but we shouldn't be naive."

Attendees applauded Qazi's statement, but it was a mea culpa that most moved them.

"We goofed up, guys," said Shakeel Syed, head of the Islamic Shura Council of Southern California. "We brought them here. We brought them to our mosques, to our meetings. . . . We have to hold ourselves responsible. That's why it's so important to dig our heels into the ground and say we're not going to take this lying down, we're going to fight."

He got the loudest applause of the night.

paloma.esquivel@latimes.com