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There is no question that the jewelry kiosks are just the tip of the iceberg.

They may be a way to funnel operational money into the country and distribute it to people. See Bin Laden network profited in diamond trade:

Saudi-born militant Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network has collected millions of dollars in the past three years from the illicit sale of diamonds mined by rebels in Sierra Leone, The Washington Post reported on Friday.
Quoting unnamed US and European intelligence officials and two sources with direct knowledge of the diamond sales, the Post described an operation that has helped finance al Qaeda.
The paper said diamond dealers working with men identified by the FBI as important al Qaeda figures bought rebel diamonds at below-market prices and sold them for big profits in Europe.

I could see them thinking: let's cut out the middle men. Smuggle diamonds into the US (dogs wont sniff them, and wont show up on x-ray or metal detectors as anything unusual), sell them ourselves in jewelry kiosks, and any operative who needs cash just needs to say the pass-phrase and pretend to buy something, and he gets a big wad of cash in the box.

More Yet:

AL QAEDA: THE DIAMOND CONNECTION

Denials Everywhere

Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda network has been using Sierra Leonean diamonds for several years as an investment and as a way of moving money without detection. And one of the RUF’s top advisors, Ibrahim Bah, has had a close and long-time connection with al Qaeda. These revelations were the main findings of a lengthy November 2 article in the Washington Post, which also linked Bah with several individuals on the FBI wanted list, including suspects sought in connection with the bomb attack on the US Embassy in Tanzania.

Ibrahim Bah is well known in Sierra Leone as one of the RUF’s chief operatives. Of Senegalese or Gambian origin, he is said to be a general in the army of Burkina Faso, and also goes by the name Ibrahima Balde. Two UN Security Council Reports name him as an RUF advisor and as one of the key figures in moving Sierra Leonean diamonds out of the region for the RUF. He has also been named as a link to RUF arms imports and UN sanction-busting. The Post article took the story one step further, saying that Bah was working for two terrorist operations, not just one. Bah, reported the Post, was trained in Libya, as were Liberian President Charles Taylor, Burkina Faso President Blaise Campaore, and RUF leader Foday Sankoh. Bah fought against Israeli forces with the Iran-backed Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, and also fought with the Mujahaddin against Soviet forces in Afghanistan in the 1980s, as did Osama bin Laden. The Post article ties the movement of RUF diamonds to a conduit through the Liberian capital of Monrovia and to two Lebanese diamond dealers based in Antwerp.

A spokesman for Belgium’s Diamond High Council said they were surprised by the news. ‘This is completely new. We are
very, very surprised,’ said Youri Steverlynck. One who was not very surprised was Harjit Sandhu, an Interpol appointee on the UN Expert Panels dealing with Sierra Leone in 2000 and Liberia in 2001. ‘Wherever diamonds are, be it Angola, be it in Sierra Leone or any place, definitely they will try to use that channel. That is common sense,’ he told reporters.

The Washington Post’s Douglas Farah reported in October
that Ibrahim Bah was a central figure in channeling RUF
diamonds from Sierra Leone to al Qaeda (see story, pg. 1).
On December 3, the New Republic reported that Liberian
officials and Ibrahim Bah intended to harm Farah, and that
Farah had been evacuated from his Abidjan home with his
wife and 2 year-old son. ‘This followed a smear campaign
by a website,’ stated the New Republic, ‘operated by the
Liberian government, that accused Farah of a variety of
crimes against Liberia and posted a photograph of him. So
add threatening an American reporter’s life to a list of
[President Charles] Taylor’s crimes that includes helping
finance Al Qaeda and starting a horrifying civil war in
neighboring Sierra Leone.’