U.S. Officials Arrest 8 in `Virginia Jihad Network' (Update3)

Bloomberg ^

[milestogo]

June 27 (Bloomberg) -- Eight men were arrested on charges they formed a ``Virginia jihad network'' with ties to the Kashmiri separatist group Lashkar-E-Taiba and planned terrorist attacks overseas, the U.S. government said.

The men, along with three others believed to be in Saudi Arabia, are accused of plotting to engage in a ``jihad,'' or holy war, in Kashmir, Chechnya, the Philippines and other countries. U.S. Attorney Paul McNulty, who announced the indictment today in Alexandria, Virginia, declined to say whether any attacks were planned in the U.S.

[milestogo]

indexing.

[swarthyguy]

Virginia is for Jihadis!

[Kathleen]

ping

[joesnuffy]

8 go out the door
10,000 come in uninvited

[AppyPappy]

putupon will be in later to blame this on Virginia Tech.

[habs4ever]

Was this group responsible for the Bali bombing?These guys maybe the AQ frontline terror killers in South East Asia.Bet you just thought they were here to make sticky rice and tamarind shrimp ;-)

[Physicist]

"Nixt tahm own thuh Vuhjinyuh Jeehawd Netwuhk, we gon' be showin' 'Deliveruhnce'. 'Deliveruhnce from th'Great Satan', that is..."

[OXENinFLA]

The men, along with three others believed to be in Saudi Arabia, are accused of plotting to engage in a ``jihad,'' or holy war, in Kashmir, Chechnya, the Philippines and other countries. U.S. Attorney Paul McNulty, who announced the indictment today in Alexandria, Virginia, declined to say whether any attacks were planned in the U.S.

Ok hold on now, if they were planing to attack Kashmir, Chechnya, or the Philippines how would they do that HERE IN THE US?

Of course Paul McNulty, declined to say whether any attacks were planned in the U.S.

Well Duh' then WHY WERE THEY HERE?

[freeperfromnj]

Ok hold on now, if they were planing to attack Kashmir, Chechnya, or the Philippines how would they do that HERE IN THE US?

You'd think these journalists would try to gather all of the facts and make sense of this stuff before they actually print it.

[Kathleen]

The father of one of those arrested alleged that his son is the "target of a witch hunt" on a radio news report. Color me skeptical.

[Cindy]

Related Link:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/936679/posts

[truth_seeker]

"He said the charges could lead to ``dozens of years'' in prison."

I should hope that our justice system would send strong messages that messing with USA national security will cost them their lives, in prison or in hell.

"Dozens of years" comes close to my definition.

[Grampa Dave]

Thanks for posting this.

[putupon]

putupon will be in later to blame this on Virginia Tech.

Naw, if anything, Tek probably helped out in this case. Keeping Kilgore occupied trashing Mr. Jefferson's University with that goofy lawsuit, he wasn't screwing things by weaseling in the way he did on ya'll's pal Gov. MarkyMark's(D) circus.

[Grampa Dave]

Well, here is another Islamofacist groups in Virgina. Not all of them are on the West Coast.

I had not heard of this group, Lashkar-E-Taiba.

Makes one wonder if they had any tie ins with the al Fuqra thugs.

[browardchad]

The men gathered for training and worship in Northern Virginia and conducted war games at paint ball facilities, McNulty said. They were charged with providing support to a terrorist organization and weapons violations.

Speaking of paintball, MSNBC did a segment on this group, pre-arrest, a week or so ago. The leader is a black Gulf War I vet (the implication being that he is therefore a loyal American, just like John Mohammed, I suppose) who appeared in full Muslim garb and, of course, declared he was being persecuted. His spiel: "If white non-Muslims played paintball games every weekend, no one would think there was anything suspicious." If it weren't for a brief quote from Steven Emerson mentioning that the group had trained in overseas Al Qaeda camps after 9/11, and that the Feds had found incriminating docs on seized computers, you might think the DOJ was declaring war on paintball, per MSNBC.

[BOBTHENAILER]

``When individuals meet here in the shadow of our nation's capital to prepare for violent jihad, we will take action,'' Assistant Attorney General Alice Fisher said at the press conference.

Just another RAT complaint taken off the board by AG Alice Fisher. I'll bet they're madder 'n hell at her for doing her job and inadvertently making them, yawn, zzzzzzzz, once again, as usual, etc., look like fools.

[Future Useless Eater]

Well, here is another Islamofacist group in Virgina.
...
Makes one wonder if they had any tie ins with the al-Fuqra thugs.

I think you're right G.Dave, I wondered the same thing...

The eight men were arrested in Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Fairfax County, Virginia.
...
They also trained in military tactics at a paintball range in Spotsylvania County, Virginia.

Comparing this to the snipers...

• The sniper car was purchased in a suburb of Philadelphia (Camden NJ),
• Muhammad was seen several times in Baltimore,
• the snipers were seen often in Fairfax County,
• the snipers even did two shootings in Spotsylvania County.

I also noticed there are two paintball ranges very near the Spotsylvania shootings.

• One paintball range at 2152 Jefferson Davis Hwy,
• One sniper murder at 5324 Jefferson Davis Hwy,
  ...
  
• One paintball range at 4415 Plank Road,
• One sniper near-murder at 2900 Plank Road, Spotsylvania Mall,
  

If Muhammad/Malvo knew these other eight jihadists, that could help explain their familiarity and attraction to these areas.

It would also give them nearby safe-houses if needed.

The indictment names 11 people, only 8 were arrested:

• Randall Todd Royer, 30;
• Ibrahim Ahmed al-Hamdi, a Yemeni national and non-resident alien;
          [reportedly of Annandale VA, 4 miles from Falls Church ]
• Masoud Ahmad Khan, 31; [reportedly of Gaithersburg, MD]
• Yong Ki Kwon, 27, a naturalized U.S. citizen born in Korea;
• Mohammed Aatique, 30, a Pakistani national and H-1 visa holder;
• * Seifullah Chapman, 30;
• Hammad Abdur-Raheem, 35; [reportedly of Falls Church, VA]
• Donald Thomas Surratt, 30;
• Caliph Basha Ibn Abdur-Raheem, 29;
• * Khwaja Mahmood Hasan, 27, a naturalized U.S. citizen born in Pakistan; and
• * Sabri Benkhala, 28.
  
  * Chapman, Hasan and Benkhala are believed to be living in Saudi Arabia.

browardchad also pointed out...

The leader [Abdur-Raheem] is a black Gulf War I vet .., just like John Mohammed
I also found that Abdur-Raheem, of Falls Church VA, is ALSO a Washington native, and ALSO converted to Islam in 1994, just like John Allen Muhammad.

Muhammad/Malvo visited Falls Church VA at least 3 times, and during one of those visits killed the FBI employee.
Siezed from one of the eight persons (Khan) was a "printout of FBI headquarters"

Gaithersburg is just a few miles from the sniper shootings at Aspen Hill, and Rockville MD.

I'm nearly CONVINCED Muhammad/Malvo knew this gang, and I wouldn't be surprised if the fed's zeroed in on these Islamists because of contacts or connections with the DC snipers.

[Future Useless Eater]

correction... The sniper car was REGISTERED in a suburb of
Philadelphia (Camden).
It was supposedly purchased in a town a half-hour to the north of Philly (Trenton).

[TexKat]

Good morning FL_, I was also thinking if there is/was a connection with John Mohammed and Iyman Faris, the truck driver double agent recently picked up. When they mentioned that Faris was a truck driver, it made me think about the 18 wheeler that witnesses reported that they saw at the Florida house where Mohammed once or occasionally resided.

[Future Useless Eater]

Another of the Islamics arrested was Donald Thomas Surratt of Suitland MD, and Temple Hills MD.

Muhammad/Malvo are also known to have been in this area because on September 05 2002, the pair was 5 miles away in Clinton MD and attempted to kill Paul LaRuffa. The snipers stole $3000 and LaRuffa's Sony Vaio laptop computer, which was later found in their blue Chevy Caprice.

By the way, the tan area is Andrews Air Force base, home of Air Force 1, and the same base that failed to scramble jets for an hour on 9/11. Major Charles Moose was somehow in charge of those jets or pilots on that day.

[~Kim4VRWC's~]

Ping to post #19...

Maryland Sniper ping list

[~Kim4VRWC's~]

Thanks for the post.

Bookmarked.. for more detailed reading in the morning..

[csvset]

Are there any pics of these guys available? I haven't seen any.

[Miss Marple]

What? Moose was in charge of those jets? How did I miss THAT one?

[Peach]

Thanks for the ping, Kim. Interesting theories and glad Steven Emerson is being listened to; his book American Jihad is an important read.

[aristeides]

Doesn't an ex-wife of Muhammad's live in Clinton?

Anybody know if that big mosque near the Falls Church shoooting is a radical mosque?

[katze]

Have to agree; too many connections to be coincidence.

[Alamo-Girl]

Jeepers! Thank you so much for all the information and the heads up!

[Happy2BMe]

"Virginia is for Jihadis!"

That's politically correct, isn't it?

[OREALLY]

This profiling has to stop!...(sarcasm )
Thanks for posting...

[Future Useless Eater]

I was also thinking if there is/was a connection with John Mohammed and Iyman Faris, the truck driver double agent recently picked up...

Hi TK,
You are right that the truck driver Iyman Faris [aka Mohammad Rauf] was a central character in this story. A TIME.com article in May said this...

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,454469,00.html Soon after Iyman Faris agreed to cooperate with FBI agents, he was brought to a safe house in Virginia where agents directed and monitored his every communication, including cell phone and e-mail messages to his bosses, TIME's Daniel Eisenberg reports. "He was sitting in the safe house, making calls for us," says a Justice Department official.
...
The FBI and federal prosecutors are investigating a group of at least a dozen mostly Muslim men in the Washington area who studied under a local Islamic scholar. Investigators are also focusing on some Maryland-based associates of Faris acquaintance Majid Khan, a onetime resident of Baltimore who U.S. officials say was tapped by al-Qaeda to lead an operation to blow up gas stations in the U.S., TIME reports.

[a U.S. indictment of Faris accuses him of working for Osama Bin Laden, and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and points out that 'gas stations' was a code word for acetylene torches used to destroy U.S. commuter bridges and trains]

John Allen Muhammad's sniper-car co-owner Nathaniel Osbourne was also studying to be a truck driver.

[piasa]

Looks like a good analysis to me.

[Grampa Dave]

Great tie ins as usual, which is why I pinged you.

It seems like even the conservative media for the most part don't want to get into the al Fuqra mess. Why? These are home grown Islamofacists. For the most part they are Black Muslims with long prison records.

Thanks again for the recaps of the DC Sniper who was a NOI Black Muslim and his murders and near murders during the DC sniping mess.

[Future Useless Eater]

What? Moose was in charge of those jets? How did I miss THAT one?

at Andrews Air Force Base, he's known as Major Charles Moose. Commander of the 113th Security Squadron of the Air National Guard

The squadron failed to scramble for over an hour AFTER it was known there were terrorists in the skies over D.C.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Looks like I should get this on the list!

Here is a lengthy but important document which should be read by all!

Jihadis in the Hood
Race, Urban Islam and the War on Terror

JIHAD IN AMERICA:

To find all articles tagged or indexed using JIHAD IN AMERICA, click below:
	click here >>>	JIHAD IN AMERICA	<<< click here
(To view all FR Bump Lists, click here)

[txhurl]

fyi

[Mitchell]

Thanks for the ping.

[Dubya]

Good info thanks.

[GummyIII]

Thanks, Kim!

[El Gato]

the same base that failed to scramble jets for an hour on 9/11. Major Charles Moose was somehow in charge of those jets or pilots on that day

Have a link for that little tidbit? Since DC ANG F-16 unit is not an Air Defense unit, and wouldn't have had any jets on alert, if they scrambled in an hour, that would be doing quite well. It takes longer than hour to prep an aircraft for a mission, which is why the dedicated Air Defense units have or had at one time, aircaft "on alert", which had already been preped My understanding is that they had some aircraft doing air to ground training missions at a range somewhere south. Some of those aircraft were returning to base when the fit hit the shan, and were ordered to land and refuel and try for an intercept, even though they had no air to air weapons loaded, other than the Vulcan cannon, and it was loaded with non-explosive practice ammunition.

I found one site that made much of the fact that the ANG and Marine units at Andrews were listed as "ready" or "combat ready". But that merely means that they are trained, and have flyable aircraft, not that they are "cocked and locked". I suspect there are a bunch more aircraft on strip alert these days than before 9-11. I do know that the local (San Antonio) F-16 Air Defense *Training* unit was reported to have 4 aircraft on strip alert, by the time the sun went down on 9-11, don't know if that's true or not, but it wouldn't suprise me. Normally, being an operational conversion and training unit, they wouldn't have any.

[JulieRNR21]

Thanks so much for the ping......interesting development.

Glad they got these guys before they could carry out their demonic plans!

[1rudeboy]

If one looks at your accusation on its face, i.e., that a local police chief is responsible for CAP over Washington, then it is very difficult from laughing out loud.

[El Gato]

at Andrews Air Force Base, he's known as Major Charles Moose. Commander of the 113th Security Squadron of the Air National Guard

The squadron failed to scramble for over an hour AFTER it was known there were terrorists in the skies over D.C.

A Security Squadron is an Air Force police/base defense unit, not a flying unit. You can tell that in part because it has the same number as it's parent wing, whereas the flying unit under that wing the 121st Fighter Squardon, has it's own number, which is standard Air Force practice.

Major Moose, assuming he was even there, which would be very unlikely on a weekday morning though not impossible, would have had nothing do with what aircraft were or were not flying. Getting aircraft into the air in an hour from a "cold start", would have been quite commendable, it might even be possible, although just barely, and even that is doubtfull. The aircraft they did put into the air, were already flying that morning, returning from an air-to-ground trainnig mission.

[Sacajaweau]

As always, you're making excellent connections involving these dudes. I have a feeling that they found more on the Sniper's computer than we know.

Watching the Sniper's travelogue, I'd say they were a strictly a "Southern Operation" group. I still believe the snipers are connected to the Anthrax mailings but only as runners. (The Sniper note and the Anthrax letters have MANY similarities.)

[Future Useless Eater]

Anybody know if that big mosque near the Falls Church shoooting is a radical mosque?

You are talking about the Dar AL Hijrah mosque at 3159 Row Place, Falls Church, VA. That would be the windmill shaped building 700 feet from the Home Depot where the FBI agent was murdered.

The mosque/islamic center is where this group of eleven were said to meet to hear lectures by an Islamic lecturer: Ali Al-Timimi,

The Michael's craft store that Muhammad/Malvo visited twice earlier in 2002 is also in the same shopping center, so in my opinion, M&M must have visited this mosque in January and August 2002. I would even bet they ESCAPED to this mosque after the murder...

And with the LEADER of this group of 11 jihadists ALSO being a black Gulf I war veteran, Washington State native, and Islamic convert, I have to assume they met at some point and knew each other.

If this aerial photo doesn't show up try the mapquest map here

As for your question, I think Freeper angkor answered it on another thread:

It is well-known that the dominant Muslim theology in Northern Virginia is Saudi Wahhabism, from the Dar al-Hijra mosque in Falls Church, to the phony "charitable foundations" Herndon, to the Graduate School of Islamic and Social Sciences in Leesburg.

[aristeides]

But wasn't there a NORAD exercise the morning of 9/11? (I heard the former commander of NORAD testify to that effect at a congressional hearing on C-SPAN a month or two ago.) Could Moose have tipped off the jihadists about that exercise and about the operational status of the Andrews fighter unit?

[aristeides]

#48.

[Bella]

This is too close for comfort! Tell you the truth, there's been MORE of these "foreigners" in the Wilkes Barre/Scranton area ALL the time..When the problems were developing, a cop friend told me there was a "group" of these people "rejoicing" in the streets.