Posted on 06/03/2006 7:40:53 PM PDT by WayneM
Terror suspects remain a mystery Jun. 3, 2006. 09:10 PM
From an unmarried computer programmer to a university health sciences graduate and the unemployed, the 17 suspects charged in a foiled terrorist plot represent a "broad strata" of Canadian society.
"Some are students, some are employed, some are unemployed," RCMP assistant Commissioner Mike McDonell said Saturday.
The 12 men in custody range in age from 19 to 43 and are residents of Toronto, Mississauga and Kingston, Ont., while the five youths cannot be identified under the Youth Criminal Justice Act.
Rocco Galati, lawyer for two of the Mississauga suspects, said Ahmad Ghany is a 21-year-old health sciences graduate from McMaster University in Hamilton. He was born in Canada, the son of a medical doctor who emigrated from Trinidad and Tobago in 1955.
Shareef Abdelhaleen is a 30-year-old unmarried computer programmer of Egyptian descent, Galati said. He emigrated from Egypt at the age of 10 with his father who is now an engineer on contract with Atomic Energy of Canada, the lawyer said.
The middle-class east-end Toronto neighbourhood that terror suspect Steven Chand calls home is filled with children, lined with two-storey homes and rich green, well-maintained lawns.
Area resident Casey Grenier, 32, stood with two neighbours enjoying a beer on a porch next door to Chand's residence were unmarked cars and police officers were parked.
"It's a real quiet neighbourhood," Grenier said. "You get up in the morning and you hear the crickets chirping."
Grenier said police pulled up at the residence around 4 p.m. with forensics trucks and a SWAT team and blocked off the street. Police were seen by neighbours leaving the residence carrying sealed Ziploc bags containing unspecified items.
Neighbours said Chand, also known as Abdul Shakur, rented a basement apartment in the home, owned by Mohammad Attique, a father of five.
Attique operated an Islamic bookstore from the home, but neighbours drew up a petition last year calling for the business to be shut down because it was being operated in a residential neighbourhood.
Neighbours said the owner had built a two-level garage behind the home to house the bookstore and was allegedly dumping glass and trash in it in an electrical field with power lines behind the house.
Grenier said residents of the home kept to themselves, but he noticed unusual activity in the early morning hours.
"You never see them during the day, always deliveries late at night, early in the morning," said Grenier, a Toronto Transit Commission employee. "I get home at about 2:30, 3 o'clock (in the morning) and you always see people coming in and out, but you just assume it's books coming out."
Grenier said residents of the home often irritated neighbours by not maintaining their property. It was the only home on the street where driveways remained unshovelled and lawns unmowed.
Residents of a Mississauga, Ont., neighbourhood knew little about Zakaria Amara, 20. Neighbours said he was an in-law of the family who lived at the home.
Neighbours said the family, a mother and her three daughters, had lived there for two years. They had not noticed a male figure in the house.
Tony Sbrocchi, 38, a neighbourhood resident for 10 years said he saw individuals backing a U-Haul into the driveway of the residence and loading up the vehicle on Monday, and that a group of three unfamiliar males left the next morning.
"It was very suspicious," Sbrocchi said, adding that he was unsure of what was being loading into the truck.
While the RCMP said suspects Mohammed Dirie, 22, and Yasim Mohamed, 24, were from Kingston, Ont., members of the city's Muslim community were at a loss as to who the men were and what they were doing in this eastern Ontario city.
"I have been asking around and no one seems to know them," Hafizur Rahman, president of the Islamic Centre of Kingston told the Ottawa Sun.
Taking into consideration the men's ages, Rahman told the Sun they may be students at Queen's University.
However, Haseeb Khan, president of the Muslim Students' Association at Queen's, also didn't recognize the men's names.
After asking members of his executive and several students at the school Saturday, he was still unsure whether they attend the university.
"We don't seem to know those people at all," he said.
I wonder if they will ever find a common thread that unites these guys.
Aren't they all Muslems?
They all speak French then?
the enquirer tomorrow tells of the unknown comic's dark side...
"I have been asking around and no one seems to know them," Hafizur Rahman, president of the Islamic Centre of Kingston told the Ottawa Sun.
Taking into consideration the men's ages, Rahman told the Sun they may be students at Queen's University. However, Haseeb Khan, president of the Muslim Students' Association at Queen's, also didn't recognize the men's names. After asking members of his executive and several students at the school Saturday, he was still unsure whether they attend the university. "We don't seem to know those people at all," he said.
YEAH, RIGHT....like we should believe you....
L
Yeah. Male mohammedans of military age. Fortunately, nobody's ever had much trouble with them before.
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
A secret army sneaking around in the dead of night planning our deaths.
...now what do these suspects have in common? ...
1. Fahim Ahmad, 21, Toronto;
2. Zakaria Amara, 20, Mississauga, Ont.;
3. Asad Ansari, 21, Mississauga;
4. Shareef Abdelhaleen, 30, Mississauga;
5. Qayyum Abdul Jamal, 43, Mississauga;
6. Mohammed Dirie, 22, Kingston, Ont.;
7. Yasim Abdi Mohamed, 24, Kingston;
8. Jahmaal James, 23, Toronto;
9. Amin Mohamed Durrani, 19, Toronto;
10. Steven Vikash Chand alias Abdul Shakur, 25, Toronto;
11. Ahmad Mustafa Ghany, 21, Mississauga;
12. Saad Khalid, 19, of Eclipse Avenue, Mississauga.
...ummmmm...
...They're all fans of the Dixie Chicks?
No? ...
... They're all Quakers?
...
Geez! I'm stumped!
I'm sure all the liberal MSM will show interviews of their muslim neighbors talking about how sweet and good these people are and how the police have it all wrong.
No, they're taking orders from the Dixie Chicks.
They are "green diaper babies." I wonder if I just invented that phrase.
yep. that's normal book store hours - no problem
http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/007124.php
The politically-correct whitewash of the Canadian terror cell has already begun in earnest. The Globe & Mail reports that the RCMP has decided to emphasize the fact that the suspected terrorists came from a "broad strata" of Canadian society:...The majority sported the traditional Muslim male beard. [emphasis mine -- CE]
Oh, dear Lord. A jihadist plot, possibly of global scale, possibly imminent, unravels in Canada...and what do law enforcement officials do? Try to whitewash the obvious jihadi profile from the public's mind.At the press briefing held by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police today, the suspects who appeared in court--all sporting traditional Muslim male beards and requesting Korans--were described as coming from a "broad strata" of society. (Hat tip: reader Ed)
Broad strata.
Yes, the same "broad strata" from which the 9/11 hijackers, 1993 World Trade Center bombers, USS Cole bombers, etc., etc., etc., came.
Allah looks at the "broad strata" of jihadi suspects netted in Toronto who are neither poor nor uneducated nor disenfranchised.
Canada's lax, terror-friendly immigration and asylum policies (and ours) will once again come under scrutiny. More info in Invasion and here; related column here and some blog posts of note. Another column from April 2003:
They are all members of the "John Murtha Martyrs Brigade"
"They are "green diaper babies." I wonder if I just invented that phrase."
I think you did! What does it mean? It sounds like it means children of environmentalist wackos.
They're all yutes!
Great clues in article of suspect activity. MO's worth noting. Great job Canadian law enforcement and all other agencies involved.
Like the Rosenbergs didn't know Klaus Fuchs, Ethel's brother.
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