Posted on 01/16/2005 5:22:26 AM PST by dead
Islamic extremists may have murdered four members of a Coptic Orthodox family found bound, gagged and with their throats slit on Friday in their Jersey City home, a law-enforcement official familiar with the case said.
The official confirmed that Hudson County investigators, as well the FBI, were "knee-deep" in pulling computer records and were coming to terms with the possibility that the family may have been targeted for death because of exchanges about religion in an Internet chat room.
The official cautioned, though, that investigators have not ruled out other possibilities, such as a robbery gone awry.
Hossam Armanious, 47, Amal Garas, 37, and their daughters Sylvia, 15, and Monica, 8, were found dead in their Oakland Avenue home early Friday after family members alerted police that nobody had heard from them in days.
First Assistant Hudson County Prosecutor Guy Gregory declined to discuss any details of the case, other than to confirm that police have ruled out a dispute the family had with a former tenant as a possible motive. He cautioned against speculating about the motive behind the murders.
"This is a very delicate investigation and one where we have spent hours at the scene collecting evidence and with the evidence collection complete, we're moving to bring in people that we feel need to be interviewed," Gregory said. "It's unfortunate that people are speculating."
But as the theory spread that revenge and religion were the driving forces behind one of the most heinous murders in the county's long history, fear enveloped the city's Coptic community.
Friends, relatives and co-worshippers of the devout family spent much of Saturday wondering how the seemingly upstanding Armanious family could fall victim to such a shockingly brutal crime. Several spoke of Hossam Armanious' participation in heated discussions about the Islamic faith on the Paltalk.com messenger service and threats he received for expressing his views about the religion.
Milad Garas, an uncle of Amal Garas, said Saturday that he was told investigators are probing whether the killings could have been prompted in part by the chat sessions. He also pointed to a passage in the Muslim holy book, the Quran, that details how enemies should be killed - bound and their throats slit, an assertion that drew a rebuttal from some Islamic scholars, but was supported by others.
A translation of passage 47:4 of the Quran reads in part: "Therefore, when ye meet the Unbelievers [in fight], smite at their necks; At length, when ye have thoroughly subdued them, bind a bond firmly [on them]."
"There is a very wide range of interpretation of that, and it depends on where people are in the spectrum," said Frederick M. Denny, a professor of religious studies at the University of Colorado and author of more than a dozen books on Islam. "If they were going toward the extremist side, it could lead someone to believe it is justified. ... There are those that take that [passage] quite literally."
The close-knit Coptic community promised protests if the religious revenge theory proves accurate.
"If it turns out they were killed for religion, then we will [protest]," said Ayman Garas, Amal's younger brother. "We have to be patient, we can't do anything stupid. ... But it looks like it is religion, maybe."
The Armanious family moved to the United States from Egypt in part to escape religious persecution. Hossam Armanious had sensed a rise in anti-Christian extremism and wanted to make a better life for his family in America, Ayman Garas said.
"What I really want to know is: How?'' he said. "We just can't believe it at this point. Everything has passed like a dream."
The details of what may have been said in the chat sessions were not known Saturday night.
Fred Ayad, deacon of the couple's St. George Coptic Orthodox Church, said that the entire community was in a "panic" over the apparent targeting of the family, as well as the murders of a Coptic deacon in December and a Coptic cabdriver in late 2003.
Prosecutor Gregory said the conjecture about the murders is hampering his office's investigation, which he said has been exhaustive.
Copts are Egyptian Christians, a minority group of about 6 million in a nation of 60 million, and have been killed in religious rioting and during attacks on Christian churches by Islamic militants. Coptic leaders also say they lack representation in the Egyptian government and are treated like second-class citizens.
Over the past decade, Copts have increasingly immigrated to the United States. Currently, they number about 1 million in this country. Coptic Orthodox churches are scattered throughout the nation and, while there is no official count, Coptic Web sites list about 10 large congregations in New Jersey and about 20 in the tri-state area.
Islamic leaders said Saturday that the murders could not have been the work of someone inspired by the Quran.
"We are not a bloody people," said Ahmed Shedeed, director of the Islamic Center of Jersey City. "This is not from the Quran. This is not from Islam at all."
Shedeed, who is Egyptian, said his group recently co-founded a social service organization with local Coptic churches, called Egyptian Family.
"We are trying to get religious leaders from both communities to meet on a monthly basis to break the ice between the people," he said. "We meet as individuals, but as organizations we never have done such a thing. We are trying to show that Egyptians together can benefit."
Shedeed said that as part of that effort, he attended Christmas Eve services at St. George's this year.
Asked about passages in the Quran that may suggest murdering non-believers in a manner that resembles the family's deaths, he replied, "The Quran talks about people fighting in the battle of war. It's not talking about people who live next to you. ... This has nothing to do with our community at all."
"The Quran stands very firmly against taking human life," said noted Islamic author Zayn Kassam, chairwoman of the religious studies department of Pomona College in California. "If someone read a verse and used it to justify the killing of four people, I believe that person is unbalanced. ... There are very few Muslims who would support this sort of thing."
On Saturday, the family received mourners at the church, as friends left lighted candles and flowers in front of the home. Neighbors talked of an exhaustive police investigation, with a former Armanious tenant, Nelly Ramirez, saying police had questioned her, her son and her son's girlfriend.
Meanwhile, friends of Sylvia, a high school sophomore who would have turned 16 on Saturday, lingered in front of the house, alternately crying and laughing. They talked of an extremely gifted teen who recently won a trip to Italy from the National Honor Society for a series of essays she wrote on topics such as Shakespeare and Charles Dickens.
"She used to write all the time," said her friend Jankil Patel, 15. "She used to go to church all the time. ... She'd debate people in class and even had a religious tattoo on her [right wrist]."
"She had a lot of friends; she was very popular," said Jessica Cimino, 15, another friend. Cimino and the other girls said they plan to attend the family funeral on Monday and wear T-shirts bearing Sylvia's image to school on Tuesday.
Ayman and Milad Garad and other family members were allowed into the crime scene for the first time on Saturday morning to gather the needed paperwork for the cemetery. They left the home with a briefcase and several other items, including a tank with several small turtles inside.
Staff Writer Kathleen Carroll contributed to this story. E-mail: troncone@northjersey.com
Yes, I did some poking around and you're correct, Kareem Abdul Jabbar was financing the Hanafi Muslims who were opposed to the Nation Of Islam.
Apparently seven people were killed in the Hanafi house on 16th Street NW, and my recollection from the time is that these murders were carried out with knives. After the murders, there was a sword-equipped guard on the grounds 7x24x365, it was pretty easy to spot him patrolling the grounds as one commuted down 16th Street every morning.
Here's what happened 2 years later, extracted from a Joni Mitchell fan site, no less:
http://www.jmdl.com/glossary/entry.cfm?id=28
Following is from the March 9, 2002 edition of the Washington Post
25th Anniversary of Terror; March 9, 2002
It came with the suddenness of September 11: a well-coordinated terrorist attack in the heart of the nation's capital, 25 years ago today. Twelve gunmen, Hanafi Muslims heavily armed with shotguns and machetes, storming into the then District Building on Pennsylvania Avenue NW, the offices of B'nai B'rith on Rhode Island Avenue NW and the Islamic Center on Massachusetts Avenue NW. Before the terrorist assault was brought to an end two days later, Maurice Williams, a 24-year-old reporter for WHUR-FM radio, had been shot dead, and dozens more had been injured, including three wounded by gunshots. Marion Barry, then a D.C. Council member, was among the injured. All told, in a 39-hour terrorist siege in Washington, 149 innocent people had been taken hostage. We forget the lesson of March 9, 1977, at our peril. Like the victims of 9-11, the victims of the violent March 9 takeover had no relation to the motives behind the assault. The Hanafi Muslims, an orthodox Islamic group, killed and took hostages in 1977 to force the government to turn over five Black Muslims convicted of murdering seven members of a Hanafi member's family four years earlier. The Hanafi Muslims also killed and maimed to stop the showing in America of the movie "Mohammad, Messenger of God" on the grounds that it was sacrilegious. Fifteen hostages at the District Building, more than 120 hostages at the B'nai B'rith building and a dozen hostages at the Islamic Center had absolutely nothing to do with the jailed Black Muslims or the showing of "Mohammad, Messenger of God." They were innocent targets of opportunity -- a condition not exclusive, but certainly common, to people living and working in the nation's capital.
There may have been some tensions, but they did some charity work together to help Egyptians. The leaders of both communities worked together.
It is very important not to isolate Muslims who desire peaceful and friendly relations. This plays into the terrorists' hands.
Any "Christian" who acts violently when we have good police and the FBI on the scene is really a terrorist who is an unwitting agent of Al Qaeda. Overwelmingly Muslims do not support this kind of violence. Let's keep it that way.
Assuming the ISP keeps the logs. And assuming law enforcement gets a subpoena on the logs before the relevant records expire and are deleted (which may be 48 hours, or two weeks, or four ... or they may be permanently archived on backup tapes, who knows).
An earlier story noted the FBI was involved in the investigation, let's hope they've brought some of their War On Terror experience to the table.
Although it was never explicitly reported (you had to read between the lines), the Moos are not a computer-savvy as believed, and the Dan Pearl murderers were nabbed because they were sending Hotmails with the source IP embedded in the header, which pointed back to an Internet cafe in Karachi. IIRC a similar thing with Kalid Sheik Mohammad.
Let's hope someone in this investigation is on the ball.
Thanks!
Fox News showed the scuffle yesterday. It was tense. Please keep us updated as you learn more.
Thankyou very much. Please keep us informed, this story mustn't just "go away".
>> Weatherby .65 cal, 250X zoom scope, with bipod all oiled up and ready to go <<
Reach out and touch a terrorist....really, really hard!!!
Glad you're on our side!
to be read later
Muslim-on-Muslim violence has its own history in this country, including the assasination of Malcolm X.
> "You say all Muslims are terrorists. I say you are all talk.
> Send me your address like you said you would. Also, do not
> besmirch Muhammad (pbuh)'s name in the future.
...or else?
It *must* be an "or else" because if it were a polite request he would have said "please".
Yup, sounds like a death threat to me. Maybe the FBI ought to be paying a visit to Mr Kramer.
The FBI has it.
The new information may be disinformation, or it may simply be that whoever killed them also took a moment to take their cash - or perhaps was looking for phone numbers or contacts, and took the cash while looking.
I don't know if they were killed by Muslim extremists, and I hope not. But there is no way they were killed in a robbery, because robbers do not do this to people and do not kill 8-yr-olds.
Personally, I incline to the idea that they were killed in connection with the Lynne Stewart trial, and that they were killed as a warning to the Coptic community.
I want general Sherman for prez. March across the ME destroying everything in his path. He would know how to take care of our muslims at home too. I hope an anti muslim party takes hold with an anti muslim prez who will do the right thing!!!
Know he's not that rude. he's just your typical computer geek who considers a date to be; his hand and his favorite pornsite!!!
Know he's not that rude. he's just your typical computer geek who considers a date to be; his hand and his favorite pornsite!!!
History TEST
Please pause a moment, reflect back, and take the following multiple choice test. The events are actual cuts from past history. They actually happened!!!
Do you remember?
1968 Bobby Kennedy was shot and killed by
a. Superman
b. Jay Lenno
c. Harry Potter
d. Muslim male extremist between the ages of 17 and 40
1. In 1972 at the Munich Olympics, athletes were kidnapped and massacred by
a. Olga Corbett
b. Sitting Bull
c. Arnold Schwarzenegger
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
2. In 1979, the US embassy in Iran was taken over by:
a. Lost Norwegians
b. Elvis
c. A tour bus full of 80-year-old women
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
3.During the 1980's a number of Americans were kidnapped in Lebanon by:
a. John Dillinger
b. The King of Sweden
c. The Boy Scouts
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
4. In 1983, the US Marine barracks in Beirut was blown up by:
a. A pizza delivery boy
b. Pee Wee Herman
c. Geraldo Rivera
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
5. In 1985 the cruise ship Achille Lauro was hijacked and a 70 year old American passenger was murdered and thrown overboard in his wheelchair by:
a. The Smurfs
b. Davy Jones
c. The Little Mermaid
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
6. In 1985 TWA flight 847 was hijacked at Athens, and a US Navy diver trying to rescue passengers was murdered by:
a. Captain Kidd
b. Charles Lindberg
c. Mother Teresa
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
7.In 1988, Pan Am Flight 103 was bombed by:
a. Scooby Doo
b. The Tooth Fairy
c. Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
8. In 1993 the World Trade Center was bombed the first time by:
a. Richard Simmons
b. Grandma Moses
c. Michael Jordan
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
9. In 1998, the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed by:
a. Mr. Rogers
b. Hillary Clinton, to distract attention from Wild Bill' s women problems
c. The World Wrestling Federation
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
10. On 9/11/01, four airliners were hijacked; two were used as missiles to
take out the World Trade Centers and of the remaining two, one crashed into the US
Pentagon and the other was diverted and crashed by the passengers. Thousands of people were killed by:
a. Bugs Bunny, Wiley E. Coyote, Daffy Duck and Elmer Fudd
b. The Supreme Court of Florida
c. Mr. Bean
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
11. In 2002 the United States fought a war in Afghanistan against:
a. Enron
b. The Lutheran Church
c. The N FL
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
12. In 2002 reporter Daniel Pearl was kidnapped and murdered by:
a. Bonnie and Clyde
b. Captain Kangaroo
c. Billy Graham
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
Nope, .....I really don't see a pattern here to justify profiling, do you?
So, to ensure we Americans never offend anyone, particularly fanatics intent
on killing us, airport security screeners will no longer be allowed to profile
certain people. They must conduct random searches of 80-year-old women,
little kids, airline pilots with proper identification, secret agents who are
members of the President's security detail, 85-year old Congressmen with metal hips,
and Medal of Honor winning and former Governor Joe Foss, but leave Muslim
Males between the ages 17 and 40 alone because of profiling.
Let's send this to as many people as we can so that the Gloria Aldreds and
other dunder-headed attorneys along with Federal Justices that want to thwart
common sense, feel doubly ashamed of themselves - if they have any such
sense.
As the writer of the award winning story "Forrest Gump" so aptly put it,
"Stupid is as stupid does."
Yes, they are lovely people, any that I have ever met.
I was trying to say that New Jersey is a very diverse state now, compared to when I lived nearby fifty years ago.
But then, so are many other cities and states.
When I drove thru a certain neighborhood in Queens last year, I could have sworn I was in Seoul.
I like all the newcomers, as long as they are legal, work hard, pay taxes, and do not slice up nice families of Coptic Christians.
That's an excellent quiz. I bet most American public school students would flunk it.
Write an email to the msm? I don't think they give a rats a@@ what I think.I(we?)could bombard them(cbs,nbc,..) w/emails till hell freezes over, and they'd continue to spew the same absurd leftist propaganda 24/7. They know who their audience is,and they play to it. About part 2 of your reply, I don't watch the msm so I don't know if their covering this or not. But your right,anytime Caucasians are involved or suspected in a hate crime the msm is right on it.
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