Muslim Hate in Canada
Over 50% of those wanted by the Ottawa police
have Muslim names
OCT 11, 2021
Jihad Watch
6.7% of the population of Ottawa is Muslim, so
Muslims are vastly overrepresented on the Wanted list.
What could account for this?
Justin Trudeau and other Canadian authorities
would like say that it’s because of “Islamophobia”: Ottawa police
disproportionately target Muslims out of “racism” and “Islamophobia.”
That is remotely possible, but it seems
inconsistent with the Canadian character, which has always been welcoming of
immigrants and tolerant of cultural differences.
Is it possible that some Muslims in Ottawa are
taught to have contempt for Infidel law, and to respect only laws of Islam?
That is a much more likely possibility, and yet Canadian officials will never
even entertain the question, because to do so would bring them dangerously
close to what they regard as “Islamophobia.” It’s better to have this explosion
of criminality than that.
Does that really make any sense?
Faisal
Hussain ID'd as gunman in deadly Danforth shooting
spree
Family of 29-year-old shooter says
he had severe mental health problems
CBC News
Jul
23, 2018
Faisal Hussain, the man identified as the assailant in Sunday's deadly shooting
rampage on Toronto's Danforth Avenue, had severe mental health problems,
according to his family.
Ontario's police watchdog, the Special Investigations Unit (SIU), released Hussain's
identity on Monday evening, hours after investigators say the 29-year-old
Toronto resident opened fire on a number of Danforth Avenue restaurants in an
attack that has left the city in shock.
Witnesses captured several chilling images and videos of the attack, which took
place around 10 p.m. ET on Sunday and left a 10-year-old girl and 18-year-old
Reese Fallon dead. More shooting victims remain in hospital, with some having
undergone multiple life-saving surgeries, according to doctors.
Hussain died of a gunshot wound after exchanging fire with Toronto police. The
SIU is looking into whether he was shot by police, or himself.
Hussain's family emailed a statement to CBC Toronto saying they are devastated
by what happened and that their son was struggling with "severe mental
health challenges," including psychosis and depression.
"We are at a terrible loss for words but we must speak out to express our
deepest condolences to the families who are now suffering on account of our
son's horrific actions," the family's statement said.
"While we did our best to seek help for him throughout his life of
struggle and pain, we could never imagine that this would be his devastating
and destructive end."
Earlier Monday, police searched Hussain's residence in the city's Thorncliffe
Park neighbourhood, but have yet to release a
potential motive for the shooting.
On Tuesday, the federal public safety minister's office said local police will
continue to lead the investigation into Hussain's background.
"There is no national security nexus at this time," communications
officer Hilary Peirce said in an email to CBC.
Several friends and neighbours who spoke with CBC
News described Hussain as quiet and shy, and some were aware of his mental
health problems.
Aamir Sukhera ran a public-speaking club,
Toastmasters, that Hussain attended. He said Hussain told him he had psychosis
and depression and was seeing a psychiatrist.
"I thought [Toastmasters] would be a good idea for him — it might help him
open up and speak," he said. "And through the process, I discovered
he had some sort of mental illness and that he was seeking help for it."
Sukhera said Hussain was polite, humble and reserved
and that he wasn't violent.
During the attack, the gunman, dressed all in black with a black baseball cap
covering part of his face, calmly walked down the Danforth Avenue sidewalk
before turning and firing a black handgun into a restaurant.
Another image, captured by a store owner's surveillance system, appears to show
him walking with the gun hanging by his side.
Other witnesses said he zig-zagged across the popular street — the heart of
Toronto's Greektown — just to pick off targets.
Hussain died shortly after exchanging gunfire with Toronto police officers on
Bowden Street, not far from the strip of restaurants where the attacks took
place.
At an afternoon news conference, Toronto Police Chief Mark Saunders said the
motive for the attack is still unclear, and he urged the public to provide any
information they can about the incident.
Saunders said no officers were injured during the firefight.
The SIU investigates all cases of death or serious injury involving police.
The SIU says a post-mortem will be conducted on Hussain on Tuesday.
Terrorism charges pending in Edmonton attacks
Suspect had been investigated in 2015 but
wasn't deemed a threat, RCMP says
CBC
News Posted: Oct 01, 2017
Terrorism-related charges are pending against a man accused of stabbing a
police officer and deliberately plowing a cube van into pedestrians in Edmonton
on Saturday night, the RCMP says.
The suspect was known to both RCMP and police, RCMP K Division Assistant
Commissioner Marlin Degrand told a news conference at
Edmonton RCMP headquarters on Sunday afternoon. The man is a Somali refugee.
In 2015, after a complaint was made to the Edmonton Police Service that the man
was displaying signs of extremism, members of the Integrated National Security
Enforcement Team (INSET) launched an investigation, Degrand
said.
The suspect was interviewed by members of INSET, but there was
"insufficient evidence" to make an arrest and the suspect was deemed
"not a threat," Degrand said.
Abdulahi Hasan Sharif is the man accused in the attacks, multiple sources have told CBC News.
Degrand said the suspect has yet to be charged but is
under arrest for offences including participation in a terrorist attack,
commission of an offence for a terrorist group, five counts of attempted
murder, dangerous driving, criminal flight causing bodily harm, and possession
of a weapon for a dangerous purpose.
The 30-year-old suspect in the attacks was apprehended following a high-speed
chase just before midnight through streets filled with bar patrons and Edmonton
Eskimos football fans. Police have said they believe the man acted alone.
The chase came to an end after the white U-Haul van he was driving struck four
pedestrians and flipped on its side.
'Broken arms to brain bleeds'
The injured police officer was taken to hospital and treated for non life-threatening injuries. Four
pedestrians were injured, with injuries that ranged from "broken arms to
brain bleeds," police Chief Rod Knecht said during Sunday's police news
conference.
One person who was listed in critical condition has been upgraded to stable.
Two others have been released from hospital. The fourth victim suffered a
fractured skull but has regained consciousness, said Knecht.
Const. Mike Chernyk, 48, was the officer injured in
the violent altercation. He has been with EPS for 11 years and was conducting
traffic duties outside the Edmonton Eskimos game Saturday night. He has since
been released from hospital and is expected to make a full recovery.
Chernyk suffered stab wounds to his face and hands
during the knife attack, said Knecht.
He said the details of Saturday's attack on the officer are
"sobering."
"He was in a struggle for his life," Knecht said, "holding onto
his gun with one hand and fending off the knife with the other."
EPS Sgt. Mike Elliott, vice-president of the Alberta Federation of Police Associations,
said even though Chernyk is a "switched-on
guy," he was still surprised at his ability to fight off the suspect.
"I wasn't sure he'd even be in condition to fend anyone off after being
hit like he was," Elliott said. "Just to see him battle like he did,
it's amazing, and I'm proud of him to see how he fended off that suspect."
Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said in a separate news conference on
Sunday in Regina that INSET was working closely with the Edmonton Police
Service on the investigation.
Officer was working alone
The officer was working alone at the time of the attack, said EPS Sgt. Michael
Elliott, vice-president of the Alberta Federation of Police Associations and
director of the Edmonton Police Association.
Normally officers work exclusively with partners, but exceptions are made when
members are hired as security or traffic control officers for special events.
"A lot of questions have come up," said Elliott. "People ask,
why was this member alone?
"In this unfortunate incident, he was working a special duty event so he
was actually hired to work the football game. But on the street, we have
criteria that when you're working, specifically at night, you're always
partnered up. You always have someone."
Elliott said the incident has left Edmonton's law enforcement community
rattled, and he's encouraging officers who may be struggling to seek help.
"We just want to make sure that our members are well taken care of, not
just physically but mentally as well," he said. "As you can imagine,
it's a trying time for every member because questions get raised like, 'Why did
this happen?'"
• Edmonton police investigate 'acts of terrorism' after
officer stabbed, pedestrians run down
Goodale said the national terrorism threat level for Canada remains at
"medium" and by all indications, public safety has been restored.
Canada will not be intimidated by terrorist violence, he said.
"We will not be intimidated by a brutal act of hate," said Goodale.
"Together, we condemn terrorist violence, today and every day, and we will
never allow it to contort the way that we want to live our lives."
The series of violent events was likely the work of a "lone wolf,"
said the city's mayor, Don Iveson, who called for
vigilance and community solidarity after the chaotic night.
'A lone wolf attack'
"I wish to urge calm," Iveson told a news
conference Sunday. "To the best of our knowledge this was a lone wolf
attack.
"Terrorism is about creating panic and sowing divide and disrupting
people's lives, so we can succumb to that or we can rise above it."
Iveson described Saturday's events as
"appalling" and commended first responders for their bravery in the
"face of chaos."
He urged Edmontonians to remain calm and united as
the investigation continues. But Iveson stressed he's
confident that police are "fully in command" of the situation.
"It is vital now that we not succumb to hatred, that we not be intimidated
by violence, and that we respond with love and strength," Iveson said. "We will not be divided."
'Hatred has no place in Alberta'
In a written statement, Alberta Premier Rachel Notley described Saturday's
events as "horrific."
"It's left us shocked at the indiscriminate cruelty and angry that someone
might target their hatred at places where we gather with our families and
friends," Notley said in the emailed statement.
"Hatred has no place in Alberta. It's not who we are. We are in this
together and together we are stronger than any form of hate."
Notley said her thoughts remain with the victims, their families and the first
responders who showed "incredible bravery."
"Our first responders are incredible people. Thank you to each and every
one of our police officers, paramedics and firefighters who put their lives on
the line to keep us safe," she said.
"Thank you, also, to the women and men who dropped everything to help
their fellow Albertans. Your bravery in moments of fear and your compassion in
moments of chaos are what's very best about us."
Members of Edmonton's Muslim community strongly condemned the attacks and
called for solidarity within the community.
Edmonton human rights activist Ahmed Abdikadir said
he felt "anger and frustration" at news the violence may have been
the work of a terrorist.
• Questions surround Edmonton 'acts of terrorism,' security
expert says
"I'm frustrated that something like this could happen here in Edmonton,
right here in my backyard," said Abdikadir,
chairperson of the steering committee of the Safety Summit, a grassroots
organization that addresses crime and racism.
"I want to compliment the heroic actions of EPS. If they were not there,
the law enforcement, it would have been a completely different tragic outcome.
"To the Edmonton community at large, I would like to tell them that we
stand together and unite against hate. And let's solve this problem
collectively, rather than pointing fingers at each other."
Trudeau outraged by tragedy
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau issued a statement Sunday, saying he was deeply
concerned by Saturday's events.
"The Government of Canada and Canadians stand with the people of Edmonton
after the terrorist attack on Saturday," he said. "I am deeply
concerned and outraged by this tragedy."
"We cannot — and will not — let violent extremism take root in our communities.
We know that Canada's strength comes from our diversity, and we will not be
cowed by those who seek to divide us or promote fear," Trudeau said.
In a statement from the White House, the Office of the Press Secretary
condemned the "cowardly" attacks on a police officer and pedestrians.
"Law enforcement authorities from the United States are in touch with
their Canadian counterparts to offer assistance with the ongoing
investigation," the statement said. "Our thoughts and prayers are
with the victims, as we hope for their speedy and complete recovery."
Edmonton police released grainy footage of a car ramming a crowd control
barricade with a uniformed officer standing beside it. The footage shows the
officer being tossed about five metres into the air
as the car slams into the front of a parked police cruiser.
The video shows two people walking by with their dogs rushing towards the
officer on the ground. But they run off when the driver gets out of the car and
appears to start stabbing the officer.
The police officer appears to wrestle with the driver on the ground and, at one
point, it appears the officer is on top of the driver. Footage shows them both
getting to their feet and the driver runs across the street while the officer
slowly follows him into traffic.
Police launched a manhunt for the suspect. Knecht said an Islamic State flag
was found in the front seat of the car and was seized as evidence.
A few hours later, while fans filed out of the football game and were re-routed
around the crime scene, a U-Haul cube van was stopped at a checkstop
north of downtown.
Knecht said the name on the identification was close to that of the registered
owner of the white Malibu.
Knecht said that when confronted, the U-Haul driver sped off toward downtown
with police cars in pursuit. The van intentionally swerved at pedestrians in
crosswalks, Knecht said.
The name of the suspect was not released. Knecht said he was known to police,
but there was no warning for the attack.
Witness Matthew Ireland, who had been at the football game and had heard that a
police officer had been stabbed near Commonwealth Stadium, was waiting in line
to get in to The Pint, just north of Jasper Avenue on 109th Street.
"We thought maybe it was just oh, a guy running from the cops, just a
police chase as usual," Ireland said. "And the next thing you know we
start to see him swerve in towards the back alley there.
"I could just see the look of panic on the guy's face. Like he knew he was
in trouble, he knew he was done, he was going to get caught pretty soon. So he just started swerving and trying to hit people,"
he said.
"And he hit two individuals that were just standing in the back alley
there. And I could see a pair of glasses or a cellphone go flying down the
alley."
Police cars followed the van and a couple of officers stopped to seal off the
area, Ireland said. Bouncers from the bar and bystanders rushed to help the two
people who had been hit by the van.
"For those individuals, I'm kind of heartbroken, to say the least,"
he said. "They're just out having a fun time, and wrong place, wrong time,
I guess you could say."
Toronto terror plot: Suspects were religious
men, according to colleagues, neighbours
By:
Jennifer Pagliaro and Allan Woods Staff Reporters
Published on Mon Apr 22 2013
Toronto Star
Accused terror plotter Raed Jaser
left a Qur’an unannounced for his Toronto neighbour. Chiheb Esseghaier’s Quebec
colleagues say his beliefs became increasingly hardline.
Raed Jaser’s neighbour remembers the Qur’an.
Small with a green cover, it was left in his mailbox one day last fall,
unannounced and unexplained, a few months after he and his family moved to
Cherokee Blvd., near Finch Ave. and Hwy. 404.
The man, who asked not to be identified to protect his family, said he put the
Qur’an back on his neighbour’s car.
He never learned his neighbour’s name until more than
a dozen RCMP officers arrived unannounced at his home on Monday around 3 p.m. —
the same time as a scheduled news conference.
The Mounties showed him a photo of the man next door, the same man whose Qur’an
he had returned.
That man, now believed to be Jaser, 35, of Toronto,
is suspected, along with Chiheb Esseghaier,
30, of Montreal, of hatching a terror plot to derail a VIA Rail train. Their
arrests Monday by the RCMP put an end to the alleged scheme.
“I was OK, but now it’s scary because I saw the news,” the neighbour
said over the phone while officers questioned his family in his home about
anything they’d noticed.
He recalled how several months after the appearance of the Qur’an a woman
believed to be living next door with his neighbour
came to the door with books and a fruit basket for his son, who had been sick.
On Monday, police said neither Jaser nor Esseghaier is a Canadian citizen, but they would not
elaborate on the men’s nationality.
According to sources, however, Jaser is Palestinian
and immigrated here from the United Arab Emirates, and Esseghaier
was a Tunisian national who appears to have been living in Quebec for the past
four years.
Esseghaier’s devout adherence to Islam reportedly set
apart him from colleagues at a high-tech research facility.
He arrived in Sherbrooke, Que. from Tunis in late 2008 and rented a small
apartment next to a laundromat for about six months. He then moved to Montreal,
a city he often visited while studying at the Université
de Sherbrooke, according to a former landlord.
In 2010, Esseghaier began working toward his
doctorate at one of the province’s jewels of advanced research, the National
Institute for Scientific Research (INRS), located just south of Montreal.
A spokesperson for the Institute said authorities did not forewarn them of his
arrest, but confirmed that Esseghaier was indeed the
student picked up by the RCMP’s anti-terror squad.
A former colleague at the Institute said she was stunned when she got a text
message Monday afternoon informing her of the terror bust.
“I’m in shock, seriously. It’s just a big surprise,” said the woman, who no
longer works at INRS.
The colleague, who asked that her name not be published, said Esseghaier was one of many international students who study
at the Institute. She also remembered him making use of its prayer room.
“He was, from what I understand, very strict in following his beliefs,” the
woman said.
Esseghaier’s profile on the business networking site
LinkedIn makes no secret of his devotion to Islam. In place of a personal
photo, there is a white-on-black image of Arabic script proclaiming: “There is
no God but Allah.”
One of Esseghaier’s classmates told Radio-Canada that
he had increasingly been sharing his “troubling” hardline religious views with
friends. He said he considered the Tunisian national to be “dangerous.”
He spoke last year at conferences in Cancun and Montreal on his research in the
field of biosensors had him speaking at conferences last year. As well, he
spoke at the TechConnect World Conference in Santa Clara, Calif. last June,
just two months before police said he came onto their radar as a suspected
terrorism plotter.
Police did not say if his entry into the United States — and the extra
screening he would have been subjected to — caught the attention of
anti-terrorism authorities on either side of the border. They also said little
about how Esseghaier and Jaser
allegedly came to be connected.
An imam at the Islamic Society of Willowdale in Scarborough said Jaser regularly attended the mosque on Victoria Park. Ave.
for over two years.
“He is a quiet person who always greeted everyone and was pleasant when he was
here,” the imam said, adding members were shocked by news of the alleged terror
plot. “He didn’t show any signs leading up to this that he was anything like
this.”
There was a large RCMP presence Monday at an industrial plaza in North York.
According to an automatic email signature, an “R. Jaser”
is a customer service representative at a moving company located in the plaza.
Muslim 'parallel society' within Canada a threat:
Report
AFP November 15, 2010
OTTAWA - Islamists aim to build a "parallel society" in Canada that
risks undermining its democracy and multiculturalism and becoming a
"catalyst for violence," warned a national security report published
Monday.
The newly declassified document obtained by the National Post says Islamic
hardliners are calling on Muslims living in Western countries to segregate
themselves and adhere only to Shariah law.
"Even if the use of violence is not outwardly expressed, the creation of
isolated communities can spawn groups that are exclusivist and potentially open
to messages in which violence is advocated," warns the report posted on
the newspaper's website.
"At a minimum, the existence of such mini-societies undermines the
resilience and the fostering of a cohesive Canadian nation."
The report was written by the Integrated Threat Assessment Centre which
collates threat information from Canada's spy service, federal police,
military, foreign affairs department and other agencies.
According to the National Post, it was circulated internally after a Hizb-ut-Tahrir conference in
Toronto last year on establishing an Islamic caliphate. "By definition,
their world views clash with secular ones. A competition for the hearts and
minds of the diaspora Muslims has hence begun," the report concludes.
It notes that Islamist hardliners while promoting the synchronization of state
laws with religious beliefs "are careful to couch their policies in terms
of Western freedoms."
They see the movement as "the peaceful advocacy of minority rights,"
it said.
But the report also notes the Dutch Intelligence Service has labeled the
movement as "sinister" and one which "could gradually harm
social cohesion and solidarity and could harm certain fundamental human
rights."
As well, it cites examples in Denmark in which Muslims bypassed the court
system to administer their own form of justice, in one case beating a man
accused of assaulting a young boy.
A portrait of terrorist
suspects
Buffalo
TORONTO - They are
being called "homegrown terrorists."
But they are not believed to be al-Qaida. More
likely, they are a group inspired by the terror organization but with no formal
links, according to law enforcement.
They are young men, all residents of Canada.
Most of them citizens.
Some are so young the Canadian government won't
release their names because they're minors. The oldest is 43.
Many came to Canada with their families, many
when they were children. They came from Afghanistan, Egypt and Somalia. At
least one is from the Caribbean.
Many of them live in the well-to-do suburbs of
Toronto.
They are all Muslim, a couple of them converts
from other religions. At least four worshipped at a tiny prayer room in a strip
mall.
But what they all had in common, allegedly, was
outrage over the West's treatment of Muslims abroad and particularly, the U.S
invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.
And they met, according to the Toronto Star,
about two years ago through Internet chat sites where they spouted their anger
and allegedly began to plot attacks.
At least some of them are believed to have
traveled to a terrorist training camp in northern Ontario modeled after
al-Qaida camps that spawned many of the Sept. 11, 2001, hijackers, according to
the Star.
An imam who says he knows nine of the 17
suspects, however, says he believes that the authorities are mistaken about the
young men.
"I have doubts that any of these guys did
anything wrong," said Aly Hindy, the imam of Salaheddin Islamic Centre in the Scarborough section of
Toronto, told The Buffalo News. "I think they're innocent. If some of them
are guilty, I don't think it's terrorism. It may be criminal, but it's not
terrorism."
Suspects known to imam
Hindy said at least four
suspects attend his mosque: Fahim Ahmad, Jahmaal
James, Steven Chand and an underage Sri Lankan who converted from Hindu to
Muslim.
Hindy said of all the
suspects, Ahmad, 21, may be guilty - but only of participating in gun
smuggling.
"He rented a car for two guys to go the
U.S. and to go get guns and sell it into the black market," Hindy said.
James, Hindy said, is
of African descent and was a convert to Islam. He had come to Hindy, known as a matchmaker in his community, to find him
a wife.
"I said go to Pakistan," Hindy said.
James, 23, traveled to Pakistan four months
ago, married a woman there, but apparently couldn't get her a visa to come back
to Canada with him.
Chand, 25, had come to Hindy
to ask for financial help at one point, Hindy said.
The Star reported that he had been unemployed for some time but recently found
work at a Middle Eastern fast food stand.
Four other suspects regularly prayed at a tiny
prayer room in a strip mall in Mississauga, Ont.
Among them was Shareef Abdelheen,
30, a computer programmer. There was also Qayyum Abdul Jamal, 43, whom Hindy said was very vocal about his distaste for the Iraq
War.
"When he sees a Muslim being killed, he
can't keep quiet," Hindy said.
The Star also reported that Jamal was a widower
with four sons and that he drives a school bus.
Another was Ahmad Mustafa Ghany,
21, the son of a physician who is in medical school at McMaster University in
Hamilton, Ont. Hindy said he recently officiated at Ghany's wedding to a 17-year-old.
He also said he knew Zakaria Amara, who like,
Jamal, wasn't shy about vocalizing his hate for the Iraq War.
"They're all from different areas,
different social levels in society, education," Hindy
said. "The whole thing doesn't make sense. Some of them are highly
educated. You doubt that it's terrorism. This has nothing to do with violent
acts. It should be handled as a criminal case."
Security experts say that, just because they're
not taking direct orders from Osama bin Laden, that doesn't mean they're to be
taken less seriously.
Leaderless cells are the MO of terror today,
experts say.
The train bombings of late in Madrid and London
are examples of how terror cells can operate, and be successful in their deadly
plans, without any direct contact with a leader.
"There aren't commands coming down from a
central authority," said Mike German, a former FBI agent who specialized
in counterterrorism and is a senior fellow at the Washington, D.C.-based think
tank Globalsecurity.org.
"These groups, they are following a
methodology," German told The News. "They're leaderless. There are
actual manuals out there on how to be a lone-wolf terrorist."
German also cautioned against dismissing the
Toronto suspects as simple wanna-bes.
"There's a tendency when they're caught
before they're able to do anything, for them to be seen as bumbling
idiots," German said. "Like Richard Reid, the shoe bomber. You tend
to think he's a clown. But this guy, in a post-9/11 environment, was able to
get a bomb on a plane. Only intervention from passengers stopped him . . . It's
really just a matter of luck whether one is successful or not. Thankfully in
this case, the good guys were able to stop it."
Canadian targets alleged
Canadian authorities say the 17 suspects tried
to obtain 3 tons of ammonium nitrate and were "planning to commit a series
of terrorist attacks against solely Canadian targets in southern Ontario,"
Mike McDonnell, assistant commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police,
said in a statement.
According to the Star, the RCMP participated
in a sting and provided the explosives to the cell before arresting the
members.
The cell wanted to blow up the offices of the
Canadian Security Intelligence Service, near the CN Tower in downtown Toronto,
and the Parliament buildings, according to the Star.
The Los Angeles Times reported that members of
the group also had discussed the possibility of hitting targets in Washington,
D.C., and Atlanta.
But White House officials said there was no
known threat to the United States.
"We certainly don't believe that there's
any link to the United States," said Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice on Sunday on CBS' Face the Nation.
However, authorities began to grow more
suspicious of the alleged Toronto cell after two U.S. citizens from Georgia
traveled to Canada last spring to meet with them to discuss attacks on oil
refineries and military bases.
One of them, Syed Haris
Ahmed, was a Georgia Tech student who tried to go to Pakistan to train at a
terrorist camp. A second man, Ehsanul Islam Sadequee,
was arrested later in Bangladesh.
More arrests expected
A government official close to the
investigation told the Associated Press that more warrants were pending and
more arrests were expected, possibly this week. The official spoke on condition
of anonymity because the case is open.
The terror sweep in Toronto has left many
unsettled, particularly in the Middle Eastern and Muslim communities that make
up this diverse, multicultural city.
In Rexdale, a
neighborhood made up of Indian, Pakistani and Indo-Caribbean communities where
the pungent smell of spices of oils fill the air,
locals were shakened and saddened by a vandalism
attack on a local Islamic center following the arrests.
Overnight, about 30 windows were smashed at the
sprawling International Muslim Organization of Toronto. Several car windshield were also broken. "It's sick," Ameer
Ali, secretary of the center, told The News. "Whoever did this destroyed a place of worship. It hurts us because we try our
best to serve this country as Canadians. We open the doors to show people that
Islam is a religion of peace."
In downtown Toronto around the CN Tower Sunday
evening, security didn't seem any tighter than usual.
Azucena Rocha, 24, an immigrant from Mexico who
works feet away from the CN Tower in a downtown coffee shop, said the arrests
left her concerned.
"I feel it was disturbing," she said
as she stacked chairs in the patio. "It's a shock for a lot of Canadians.
You expect these things to happen in the States, not Canada. I'm not saying the
U.S. is a bad country. They're just usually the targets.
David DiLella, who
was out on an evening stroll by the tower with his girlfriend, Erin Dimeno, described the weekend's events as "a wake-up
call" for Canda.
He also said he believed peaceful Muslims
aren't doing enough to quell the violence within their ranks.
School Ties Link Alleged Plotters
Arrested Canadians Had Bonded at Clubs and on
Soccer Fields
By Doug Struck
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, June 11, 2006; Page A16
TORONTO -- They were school pals. One is 15.
Most are just out of high school, some still in. The 17 boys and men whom
Canadian police are calling "homegrown terrorists" forged their bonds
in student clubs and on school soccer fields, chatted on the Internet, and
urged each other to be heroes for their faith.
The arrests last weekend left many Canadians pondering how a country proud of its diverse
culture and political moderation could spawn such an apparent interest in
violence. Especially by people so young.
What started as boasts and youthful rhetoric
crystallized into action, the government says. The youths ordered $4,000 worth
of ingredients for a bomb, built a detonator and cased out targets for a
two-pronged attack that would take hostages on Parliament Hill in Ottawa while
setting off bombs in Toronto, prosecutors contend.
The plans allegedly ranged from the fanciful --
steering remote-controlled toys loaded with explosives into police stations --
to the meticulous. The suspects calculated the exact solutions of nitric acid
and grams of mercury they would need to detonate the bombs, according to a
summary of the prosecutors' allegations reviewed by The Washington Post.
The school ties have some people here asking if
Canada's attempt to accommodate all faiths and backgrounds -- many Canadian
schools offer rooms for Friday prayers and foster Muslim student clubs -- is
encouraging religious divisions. Some of the clubs "are very conservative,
very judgmental," said Rizwana Jafri, a Muslim
and an administrator at a Toronto-area high school. "Young people are
looking for a group to belong to, and religion plays into that. It's almost
cult-like."
Suspect Saad Khalid, now 19, is typical of
those charged. At Meadowvale Secondary School, he was bright and outgoing in
his early high school years, fellow students told reporters last week. His
father, a technology professional from Pakistan, lived in Saudi Arabia before
coming to Canada 10 years ago. The family recently moved to a brick townhouse
in one of the new suburban developments being carved out of farmland in
Mississauga, a spreading suburban town west of Toronto.
In 2003, Khalid's mother died in an accident.
In the following years, he became more strident about his Muslim faith. He
formed athe Religious Awareness Club to preach Islam
during lunch hours at the Meadowvale school. He spent time with two older
classmates, Fahim Ahmad, now 21, and Zakaria Amara, 20, the government
contends.
Meadowvale is a bustling, brick school in the
heart of Mississauga. Teenage boys in T-shirts and baggy jeans lolled about the
campus last week. A smaller knot of young girls, with Muslim headdress, stood
in the shade of a tree. School officials declined to speak to reporters and
urged students to do the same.
"Young people who are disenfranchised or
ill-fitting in a society look for ways to belong, and sometimes religion plays
to that, creating a desire for martyrdom, a desire to be a hero," Jafri
said. In her view, the school clubs they form sometimes paint an extreme view
of a Muslim world at odds with the secular values the school is trying to
teach.
Khalid and his pals spent time in a chat room
on the Internet and called themselves the "Meadowvale Brothers."
According to the Globe and Mail newspaper, which reported on the electronic
chat diary before it was removed from the Web, the young men's talk dealt with
movies and final exams. But Zakaria Amara kept returning to the issue of
sacrifice for Islam.
"I love for the sake of Allah, and hate
for his sake," he wrote, according to the newspaper.
Khalid and the others began attending a mosque
together, teacher Ahmed Amiruddin told CBC Radio last
week. "They would enter into the mosque to pray. They would come in
military fatigues," he said. "It looked to me like they were watching
a lot of these Chechnyan jihad videos online."
Gradually, they gravitated to the Al-Rahman
Islamic Center, a storefront mosque in a small strip mall in Mississauga. There
they met Qayyam Abdul Jamal, 43, a taciturn Pakistani
native with an angry view of the world. He cleaned the rugs and took out the
trash at the mosque. For those services, the directors tolerated his vitriolic
speeches that portrayed Muslims as oppressed by the West, according to people
familiar with the mosque.
"Many people who worked with him thought
he was just a loudmouth," said Tariq Shah, a lawyer who represents the
mosque. "In retrospect, maybe it was wrong that he wasn't taken more
seriously."
Across Toronto at an eastern suburb called
Scarborough, a similar process was underway, at the Stephen Leacock Collegiate
Institute, a high school. An alumnus of the school, Mohamed Durrani,
19, and another man, Steven Vikash Chand, 25, a former Canadian army reservist,
frequented the school grounds to encourage Muslim students to come to the
mosques, students and acquaintances told reporters last week. At least two of
the juveniles, a 10th-grader and a 12th-grader who are not being identified
because of their ages, joined their group.
The group proved inept at keeping its
activities secret. The complaints about Jamal, and some of the Internet
traffic, drew the attention of investigators as early as two years ago, police
officials have confirmed.
Then, in March last year, two Atlanta-area men
already under scrutiny in the United States traveled to Toronto to meet
Khalid's older acquaintance Fahim Ahmad and a friend from the Scarborough
group, Jahmaal James, then 22, according to an FBI
affidavit. They allegedly talked about targets for terrorist attacks in North
America and the possibility of training in Pakistan.
That summer, Ahmad used his credit card to rent
a car for two immigrants from Somalia, Mohammed Dirie,
then 22, and Yasin Abdi Mohamed, 22. Those two drove
to Columbus, Ohio. When they arrived at the border to return to Canada, guards
stopped the car and searched the two. They reported finding a pistol tucked in
the back waistband of Mohamed's pants and two more semiautomatic weapons taped
to the inner thighs of Dirie.
The arrests and visit by the men from Georgia--
both with ties to Ahmad -- prompted Canadian intelligence and police officials
to begin physical and electronic surveillance. Authorities apparently were
watching last November, when Zakaria Amara drove to northern Ontario.
Prosecutors offer the following account for how the conspiracy unfolded from
there:
Amara stopped at the local police and Natural
Resources Ministry offices to inquire about nearby forests. He returned to the
area the week before Christmas and set up a camp in woodlands near the town of
Orillia. Eleven men and boys came with him. They wore camouflage uniforms,
fired a 9mm pistol, played paintball, and engaged in training "clearly for
terrorist purposes."
They made plans for a second session at the
camp. They named their scheme "Operation Badr,"
after a battle of early Islamic history, and discussed strategies. They would
take politicians hostage in the capital, demand the removal of Canadian troops
from Afghanistan and the release of Muslim prisoners, and execute the
politicians "one by one" if the demands were not met.
Ahmad put a deposit down on another illegal
firearms purchase. The suspects scouted out a house where they could retreat
after staging an attack. They shoplifted walkie-talkies. Amara plumbed the
Internet at public libraries to learn how to assemble a bomb. Durrani enrolled in flight training but eventually backed
out, believing he would attract too much attention.
The group had business cards printed up to pose
as fictional "student farmers" to raise fewer suspicions as they
bought the fertilizer for a bomb.
But as the conspirators talked and made plans,
they fractured in disagreement. Zakaria Amara wanted to use truck bombs. Fahim
Ahmad favored an attack with guns. Amara thought Ahmad was taking too long.
In the end, they settled on both methods, the
government contends. Amara and the Mississauga group would bomb a site in
Toronto -- the final list included a downtown Toronto skyscraper containing the
offices of Canada's spy agency, the Toronto Stock Exchange and a military
establishment. At the same time, Ahmad, who had moved to Scarborough with the
group there, was to storm the Parliament or some other public place.
By last month, Amara had concluded that they
needed three tons of ammonium nitrate -- the group wanted to make a bomb bigger
than the two-ton explosive that Timothy McVeigh used to shatter the federal
building in Oklahoma City in 1995, killing 168 people.
When the youths ordered the fertilizer, agents
intercepted the shipment and substituted an inert powder. Police watched as
Khalid and one of the youths worked at a rented warehouse June 2 to prepare to
receive the shipment. The two lined cardboard boxes with plastic to store the
material. When Amara paid $4,000 to an undercover officer for the fake
fertilizer, the police descended. Khalid and the juvenile were arrested at the
warehouse. Squads of officers positioned around Toronto rounded up the others
through the evening.
Khalid is now at Ontario's Maplehurst
Correctional Center in solitary confinement. His cell has a metal bed, two
blankets, and a light bulb that stays on all night. He met with his lawyer
Thursday, but the two were separated by a glass shield and were able to talk
only on a telephone. Khalid held it awkwardly, with his wrists still handcuffed
together, said the lawyer, Arif Raza.
"Obviously, he's very down," Raza
said. "Very depressed."