CREDIT: Peter Redman, National Post
Shaheed, a Torontonian of Acadian and aboriginal
ancestry formerly known as Daniel Sonier, says
he was targeted by extremists seeking to sway him
to their views. He has since rejected those views.
Posted on 06/30/2006 7:44:44 AM PDT by GMMAC
Making of a zealot
'The first time I saw an al-Qaeda video, I was ready to go'
Stewart Bell
National Post
Friday, June 30, 2006
CREDIT: Peter Redman, National Post
Shaheed, a Torontonian of Acadian and aboriginal
ancestry formerly known as Daniel Sonier, says
he was targeted by extremists seeking to sway him
to their views. He has since rejected those views.
His name used to be Daniel Sonier, but that was when he was a troubled Scarborough teenager with dreams of becoming a rap star.
Now he is Shaheed.
In Arabic, it means martyr. It is the name the 22-year-old of Acadian and aboriginal ancestry adopted when he became a Muslim five years ago.
Since his conversion, he has shed his baggy hip hop garb for a white turban and gown, married a woman from Djibouti and fathered two children.
"Those who were around me, who knew me from the past, they see me now, they don't even recognize me," he said.
"They call me Daniel, but really, in my heart, I'm Shaheed."
An estimated 3,000 people are, like Shaheed, converting to Islam each year in Canada, according to a Canadian Security Intelligence Service report.
From a security perspective, that is not a concern. What troubles counterterrorism officials is the "small number" of converts who are being recruited into the Islam faith's radical fringe.
At least two of the 17 suspects arrested in Toronto on terror charges on June 2 were converts, and Canadian intelligence reports declassified under the Access to Information Act reveal links between conversion and terrorism.
Conversion to the extremist brand of Islam is "a phenomenon of increasing concern to Western governments," one CSIS intelligence study says.
"In the 19th and 20th centuries, disillusioned individuals were known to have channelled their grievances and energies through various ideological movements," says another Canadian intelligence report. "Today, some individuals of this nature have chosen extreme Islam."
Richard Reid the shoe bomber, the American Taliban John Walker Lindh, the Australian Taliban David Hicks, Andrew Rowe of Britain and Christophe Caze of France are cited in reports as examples of converts run amok.
One of the four suicide bombers who killed more than 50 people in London last July 7, Germaine Lindsay, was a Jamaican-born British citizen who had converted to Islam.
Recruiters are deliberately seeking converts, who are sometimes referred to as "white skins," because of their strategic value, intelligence reports say.
"The attraction of converts for extremist Islamic groups is clear," CSIS says in a "secret" report titled Canadian Converts to Radical Islam.
"These individuals have a solid knowledge of Western society, can move with relative ease internationally because of their countries of birth, and exhibit a religious zeal typical of new adherents."
Shaheed was once one of them.
"The first time I saw an al-Qaeda video, I was ready to go," he said in a recent interview. "I wanted to kill the disbelievers."
His long-time friend Chris Jakubowski, a convert who has adopted the Muslim name Yacub, said Shaheed was so extreme he once said he would go to war against his own father. Friends started calling him Osama bin Daniel.
"He was definitely really hardcore," Yacub said.
Shaheed often spoke about going overseas to fight those he considered the enemies of Islam, said Yacub, who has known him since the third grade.
"Either Afghanistan or Chechnya or Iraq -- wherever the fighting was going on at the time. He definitely talked about going over there and getting prepared and he wanted to be with the believers, and was ready to harm any disbeliever that would harm his brothers over there," he said.
"Obviously, he was going a little too far."
Concerned about the rhetoric, CSIS officers dropped by Shaheed's house to speak to his father. Shaheed has calmed down since then, but his friend Steven Vikash Chand was among the terror suspects arrested in Toronto a month ago.
Recent converts like Mr. Chand, who was born a Hindu, are prime targets for extremist recruiters who selectively cite scripture to convince their followers that fighting jihad is the highest act of devotion.
"They target the new Muslims because they don't know anything," said Shaheed, his blond locks spilling out from the folds of his turban.
This "cut-and-paste" Islam, which emphasizes fighting, death and destruction instead of study and prayer, worries Muslims like Shaheed.
It also worries CSIS.
"Converts in particular are prone to extreme views because of their newfound zeal," a "secret" CSIS report says. The "belief that their governments/societies are responsible for the suffering of their co-religionists will push some to extremism.
"As the fight against terrorism continues, converts could play a greater role -- including operational activities," CSIS writes.
Another intelligence report says, "It is possible that an attack will be carried out by a radicalized individual -- possibly a convert to radical Islam -- seeking to punish Canada for its actions abroad."
Intelligence reports portray radical Islam as the cause of the day for social outcasts who might have joined cults or leftist revolutionary groups in another time. Indeed, conversion to extremism often appears to have more to do with a personal crisis than the cause itself.
"Much like the attraction of extremist ideologies of past decades, radical Islam will continue to appeal to the disenfranchised and those struggling with a personal or spiritual crisis," one report says.
Shaheed was raised in a Roman Catholic household in the heart of Canada's most immigrant-rich city, Scarborough, a suburb of Toronto.
He went through a heavy metal phase, then became a punk rocker, a goth and a Satanist. He went through a Marilyn Manson period and experimented with black magic and the Book of the Dead.
"We were both pretty crazy," said Yacub.
As a teen he tried acting and was a rapper known as Prophet. He joined a hip-hop group. He would watch the Grammies and Oscars on TV and dream of stardom.
"I used to smoke weed all day, that was my lifestyle," he said. "I'd go home, bro, and I'd be so sick and drunk I couldn't see.... I was so sick and tired of my lifestyle."
Despondent, he began exploring religion. A friend suggested he visit a mosque, where he met some "brothers" who explained the five pillars of Islam.
He started reading about Islam and pondering the inevitability of death and the futility of material pursuits, he said. "What Allah showed me was, don't love this world because it's of impermanence," he said in a videotaped testimonial posted on a Web site for converts.
He converted in 2001, when he was 17, in the back seat of a car, by reciting the Muslim declaration called the shehada: "There is no God but God and Muhammad is the Prophet." Usually, it happens at mosque, but Shaheed couldn't do that because he was under house arrest at the time for robbery and threatening death.
The first time Yacub saw Shaheed after his conversion, he was taken aback by the transformation in his friend's behaviour. He had stopped smoking, drinking and using drugs. His appearance had changed as well.
"Sure enough, I see this guy in this big long thing that looked like a sheet. It looked like he just walked out of the deserts of Arabia, with a big giant turban wrapped around his head."
His father did not take the conversion so well, he said. The 9/11 attacks had tainted his dad's view of the religion, he said. So Shaheed moved out.
The recruiters were waiting.
Shaheed quickly picked up on harsh talk he heard around the Saleheddin Islamic Centre, where he said the religious message was heavily politicized.
As a new convert, he did not know enough about Islam to understand that he was being duped by hatemongers looking to exploit his ignorance and zeal.
"Me and a lot of guys I know come from hip-hop culture, and it tends to glorify guns and violence and drugs and so forth. You still kind of have this mentality in your subconscious," he said.
"When they come to you with this ideology -- 'fight and kill the infidel'-- and since you still have this thought in your head, it's easy, especially because of lack of knowledge.
"Instead of stressing the fact of getting knowledge and learning how to pray properly, they're already down your throat about killing the infidel. They always seem to be talking bad about Canada, but yet they want to live here and take welfare and use the system."
Another Salaheddin worshipper, Fahim Ahmad, an alleged ringleader of the Toronto terror cell, once handed Shaheed an al-Qaeda recruiting video, but he said he never watched it. He has seen other videos, though, and says they have a powerful effect.
"When you've got this guy spewing rhetoric at you and at the same time watching the video, it all just comes together," he said.
Shaheed had never heard of CSIS until intelligence officers came calling. The agency looked into Shaheed's circle of associates, but he has put that behind him now. "He worked through it," Yacub said.
The more he learned about Islam, the more spiritual he became and the less he was interested in fighting. He still believes in jihad, but only under strict conditions -- and not in Canada.
Women have also been converting, either through marriage or as a result of their own spiritual search. Tanya Evans lived in three foster homes and felt completely alone. In high school, she met a Muslim boy and began learning about Islam.
"That's when the doors started to open for me," she said in a videotaped statement on the Toronto-based Web site for converts. Eventually, she became a Muslim. "My life has completely changed," she said. "Basically, now I belong."
While a Belgian woman was sent to Iraq as a suicide bomber, it is still rare for female converts to be directly involved in terrorism, although counter-terrorism authorities say wives are sometimes aware of their husband's terror-related activities.
Shaheed's own experiences as a convert and his dealings with radicals have convinced him that Canadian Muslims need to confront the problem of youth extremism.
He and his fellow volunteers, who run a support group for converts called Paradise 4 Ever, believe the best way to inoculate young people against terrorist recruiters is to expose them to proper Islamic teachings so they have the tools to refute extremists.
"We're the solution to this."
sbell@nationalpost.com
© National Post 2006
"We're the solution to this."
WRONG-O 'Shaheed' !!!
Meet the most appropriate solution:
PING!
Not directly related to your post, but I've been trying to come up with a new tagline that better reflects my views on Islam. Here are two possible ones, any thoughts?
"Islam - always militant, by definition (and design)"
or
"Support abortion! Pre, partial and post-birth for Muslims."
Like mine? ;)
There may be moderate Muslims, but there is no moderate Islam.
3000 converts a year? Ewww...
Based on my own direct experience with muslim neighbours and co-workers you are 100% correct. The character of the muslim individuals I know personally is completely at odds with Islamic doctrine, but they are also not fully observant and probably don't realize what the Koran says.
Sounds like Islam is a sideways move.
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