Posted on 07/20/2005 6:41:28 PM PDT by Splatter
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Investigators probing the London terror bombings are focusing on an elusive British Muslim suspect who is connected to a previous plot to set up a terrorist training camp in rural southern Oregon, according to U.S. counterterrorism officials.
Officials told both NBC News and CNN Wednesday that Haroon Rashid Aswat, believed to be a mastermind of the London bombings, is the same British-born Muslim of Indian descent who scouted a Bly, Oregon ranch to set up a terror camp.
These officials said Aswat, a Pakistani national being sought for questioning as a person of interest by British authorities, was among three unindicted co-conspirators in the Oregon incident.
U.S. officials said a 2002 indictment in the Bly case links Aswat directly to Abu Hamza al-Masri, a fiery, one-eyed radical cleric from a London mosque who is now on trial in Britain for possessing al-Qaida literature and inciting the killing of Jews and other non-Muslims.
"I think this just gives us a glimpse into what might be happening inside the United States," said retired Air Force Lt. Col. Rick Francona, an NBC News terrorism expert. "We were able to uncover one operation — how many others are out there?"
"What's very scary is not only can they travel very easily through Europe, they could travel very easily to the United States because of their British citizenship," added retired Portland State University professer Gary Perlstein, a KGW terrorism expert.
The documents reveal Aswat worked with a Seattle man, James Ujaama, who pleaded guilty in 2003 to a charge of providing support to the Taliban for his role in trying to set up the "jihad training camp." Ujaama is now cooperating with federal prosecutors.
The southern Oregon ranch that may have been scouted as a potential terrorist training camp. (KGW Photo)
Court documents in the Ujaama case said a conspirator, whom U.S. officials identified as Aswat, arrived in New York City in November 1999 on Abu Hamza's orders. He made his way to Oregon, according to the documents, "for the purpose of evaluating the Bly property as a jihad training camp."
In the indictment, prosecutors also alleged the conspirators "met potential candidates for jihad training ... established security for the Bly property ... and they and others participated in firearms training and viewed a video recording on the subject of improvised poisons."
The documents also said Aswat, along with another conspirator, lived in Seattle in early 2000 and "expounded on the teachings" of Abu Hamza.
Aswat, in his early 30s, has family that lives in Leeds in northern England, where three of the four suspected London suicide bombers resided. At his family's house, neighbors said they haven't seen Aswat in nearly 10 years.
Aswat's believed to be hiding out in Pakistan, where government officials said he wasn't in custody and remained at large as of Wednesday night.
Actually the defunct camp and many of the players today are old news to many of us. Here is data going back 3 years ago.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1143148/posts?page=11#11
TexKat; Pikamax; FL_engineer; piasa; SAMWolf; dixiechick2000; B Knotts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/715524/posts
Oregon sheriff: 'We had our suspicions' (al-Qaida in Oregon)
Seattle Times ^ | July 13, 2002 | Hal Bernton, Mike Carter and David Heath
Posted on 07/13/2002 1:59:56 AM PDT by sarcasm
BLY, Ore. — This hard-knocks hamlet seems an unlikely place to search for clues to the al-Qaida terrorist network.
It sits on an arid plateau in Southern Oregon, about 50 miles east of Klamath Falls. With a population of about 250, it has a couple of cafes and small stores, an antique shop, and the razed foundation of an abandoned lumber mill.
But in late 1999, federal authorities and other sources say, the area had something far more unusual: militant Muslims scouting a ranch outside of town as a possible training camp for jihad fighters.
That aborted effort has now thrust Bly into the thick of a Seattle-based FBI and federal grand-jury investigation into al-Qaida's activities in the United States. Authorities suspect that a group of Seattle-based Muslims, mostly U.S. citizens, were operating as a "cell" in support of al-Qaida, and that opening a terrorist-training camp was part of their plans.
For about six months beginning in September 1999, Semi Osman — a cleric at a small Seattle mosque named Dar-us-Salaam — lived on the ranch, a few miles outside town. Osman is now in federal custody in Seattle, charged with immigration and weapons violations and under investigation for terror-related activities.
Sources say Osman's visitors on the Bly ranch included two members of a London mosque led by Sheik Abu Hamza al-Masri, a radical cleric believed to be an al-Qaida recruiter, and militant members of Osman's Central Area mosque. Some of the visitors rode horses and fired automatic weapons, according to people in the area.
Police began to watch the ranch closely, said Klamath County Sheriff Tim Evinger.
THE SEATTLE TIMES
"There were reports of gunfire and of a large group of suspicious, or unusual, people there," Evinger said.
Gunfire is common in rural Southern Oregon, where many residents carry arms and engage in target practice or hunting.
But this information concerned the sheriff enough that he turned it over to the FBI. He heard nothing again until after the Sept. 11 attacks, when the information gained new importance. His detectives were briefed about the federal investigation late last year, Evinger said.
"I think even before then, we had our suspicions about what this might be," he said. "You expect terrorist activity in the big cities. I think people need to realize this sort of stuff can happen anywhere."
Neighbors say Osman, now 32, kept a low profile, tooling around in a beat-up 1984 Toyota sedan and at one point commuting to Klamath Falls to work as a mechanic, according to neighbors and a former employer.
Still, he and his family got plenty of notice. In this community of bluejeans and boots, the balding, bearded Osman dressed in a tunic and skullcap. His wife, an American who converted to Islam, dressed in a long robe and headscarf in traditional Islamic fashion. A young daughter attended the local school.
Some Bly residents who knew Osman say that he was friendly and polite, and often spoke of his hopes to join the U.S. Army after he left the ranch. Osman, a naturalized British citizen with permanent U.S. residency status, was a member of the U.S. Naval Reserve.
But at least one neighbor, retired carpet layer Perry Thompson, clashed with Osman.
Thompson said Osman was a high-strung man who didn't like unexpected visitors. On two occasions, Thompson said, an armed Osman confronted him. In one of the incidents, Thompson said, Osman forced him to stop his truck by driving up from behind and parking in front of him, then he jumped out of his car, ran to his window and pointed a semiautomatic handgun at his head.
"He had all kinds of guns," Thompson said. "And he was belligerent."
HAL BERNTON / THE SEATTLE TIMES
Later residents of the Bly ranch have found spent and live ammunition from semiautomatic weapons.
A Bly tow-truck driver, Billie Livingston, also reports an unsettling visit to the ranch. Coming to jump-start a dead battery, she was surprised to find a half-dozen men, some of whom appeared foreign-born, intently watching her.
Among the men at the ranch in December 1999 were two men who federal investigators believe were sent by al-Qaida leaders to check out the ranch as a potential training camp.
The men's presence in Southern Oregon was documented in a speeding ticket issued that December in Klamath Falls. According to a source, the police officer became suspicious of the occupants of the car and checked their identification.
Later, federal agents would determine the men had arrived from Great Britain two weeks earlier.
"Those men," the source said, "were there for a bad purpose."
The two men were followers of Abu Hamza, leader of the North London Central Mosque in Finsbury Park, the heart of militant Islam in Europe.
Abu Hamza applauded the Sept. 11 attacks. His mosque had been attended by Zacarias Moussaoui, the only man charged in connection with the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States, and by Richard Reid, the man accused of trying to blow up an American Airlines jetliner with explosives in his shoes.
Osman's attorney, Robert Leen, denies his client has any involvement with terrorism. Others who know Osman say that he was uncomfortable with the militancy of his visitors and that he sought to distance himself from them.
The Bly ranch had been owned by Esther Fisher Schneider, who died in August 1999 at age 82. She had moved from Washington state to Bly in the 1990s with a sheep rancher named Ivan Rule, known among Bly residents for espousing extreme right-wing political views.
The property is now listed as owned by the late Schneider and the Barraka Communal Corp., a nonprofit corporation created by Rule and an American Muslim woman who lived with him in 1999.
In February 2000, Osman and his family left the ranch. The daughter and son-in-law of neighbor Perry Thompson, Lona and Paul Azevedo, moved in. In walks on the property, the Azevedos have collected ammunition from semiautomatic and other weapons.
Rule, who no longer lives in Bly, was not available for comment. The IRS has a tax lien against him in Fremont County, Colo., in the amount of $10,041, dating from May 1994.
Lona Azevedo says she continues to pay rent to Rule through a Bly post office box, but she is not sure where he lives.
Meanwhile, yesterday in London, Abu Hamza denied any knowledge of a plot to set up a terrorist camp in Bly, or of a cell of al-Qaida supporters in Seattle.
"We have quite a good following in America, but we don't keep a structure because we are talking about principles," he told NBC.
"I have friends everywhere," he said. "When you are arresting people in America under suspicion, you might as well arrest the rest of the planet."
All yes Dixie Chick 2000, Sam Wolf's and my favorite graphic art showing the political nature of the Love a Jihadist rulers of Portland.
"Why is there a terrorist camp in Oregon?"
Because our government fails to acknowledge that islam is a terrorist organization.
Add all criminal illegal aliens,and I will vote for it!
Thanks for the ping.
Brings back old memories going back 3+ years.
It was closed down before it really got started back in 2001/2002.
The publicity the camp and jihadists got on Free Republic and some NW newspapers closed it.
Which one is correct? Asshat, or Asswad?
Haroon Rashid Aswat
Look it up as a key word in this thread and then the other links that come up with the keyword: HaroonRashidAswat
"Actually the defunct camp and many of the players today are old news to many of us."
Yep.
A Bly tow-truck driver, Billie Livingston, also reports an unsettling visit to the ranch. Coming to jump-start a dead battery, she was surprised to find a half-dozen men, some of whom appeared foreign-born, intently watching her.
Among the men at the ranch in December 1999 were two men who federal investigators believe were sent by al-Qaida leaders to check out the ranch as a potential training camp.
Lets see who was President in 1999. Oh yeah, it's Bush's fault.
Amazing how so many anti GWers are jumping all over this.
The activity was done in late 1999. Of course that was Bush's fault.
This was well settled re the camp by the end of 2001.
Well, when are we going to hold these people responsible for sticking up for terrorist who are in the US ? The Muslims have infiltrated all aspects of American life already .The NY area is SWARMING with them . Am I the only one alive who sees how dangerous this is .No one else see's the plan here but me ? Liberals be damned , they will cause the death of us all soon enough .We need to CLOSE the US until further notice and THEN find out who the hell is living here ..May be too late already
Of course it's Bush's fault,
OR
Of course it's Karl Rove's fault.
OR
It's the Jews' fault.
OR
It's the Christian, Jews and other infidels
and it's their fault.
OR...
government fails to acknowledge that islam is a terrorist organization
As does the MSM and every other leftist organization in the US..
FYI, this was one of the semi camps of the Jihad in America we discussed on the earlier threads this week,
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1438409/posts
"Terror Strike- London!"
various FR links & stories | 07-07-05 | t
Posted on 07/07/2005 10:21:18 AM PDT by backhoe
ON THE NET...
http://www.johnathangaltfilms.com
"Actually the defunct camp and many of the players today are old news to many of us."
"Yep."
Seems that "old news" has come full circle to bite people in their Asswat. The London slaughter should not be old news. the next time there is Fresh news it could include you or me.
It is time Blue States prevent MASS MURDER. We must stop the PC BS Police.
My vote is about all I have and that ain't worth much on the left coast.
So, it's a combination of Asshat and Asswad? How fitting.
stepping back in time...
http://www.techcentralstation.com/102402D.html
TECH CENTRAL STATION: "UJAAMA AND MUHAMMAD"
by Greg Buete
October 24, 2002
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Printable.asp?ID=3321
FRONTPAGE MAGAZINE.com (LA TIMES): "AL QAEDA CAMP IN OREGON"
by Patrick J. McDonnell
September 24, 2002
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/84729_ujaama29.shtml
SEATTLE PI.com - SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER: "UJAAMA INDICTED ON TERROR CHARGES"
"Accused of giving al-Qaida training facilities, personnel"
by Sam Skolnik and Chris McGann
August 29, 2002
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.