17 Arrested in Toronto

Update: See a video of the press conference at the Islamic Foundation here.

I'm sure you've heard of this at some point in the past few days:
17 men arrested on terrorism related charges in Toronto.

This news comes as a shock and disappointment to me... to find out that Muslim youth, not much older or younger than I am, could allegedly be part of something like this so close to home. Most of the accused are from Mississauga and I think one or two are from Scarborough.

Although innocent until proven guilty, if they are infact guilty it serves as a wake up call for Muslim families, organizations, mosques, schools and the general public as well. This kind of thing does happen in Canada... we're not immune to it, as many people might think.

Yesterday, there was a press conference at the Islamic Foundation of Toronto (Nugget Mosque) where one of the accused used to attend. I hadn't had any prior information about it or else I would have attended, but I did catch part of it on the radio on the way to work. Shaikh Patel, Imam of the mosque and acting as spokesperson for the Canadian Council of Muslim Theologians read out a statement, (among other points) thanking CSIS and the government for thwarting a planned terrorist attack.

I think everyone, even those Muslims who are critical of CSIS and the government need to be thankful. This isn't about racial profiling or prejudice. It's about public safety... my safety... yours... ours.

What's troubling is that while one group may have been uncovered, there may be many more... not just in Toronto, but across Canada. What is equally troubling is the backlash that the Muslim community will undoubtedly suffer as a result of these arrests. Already the IMO has fallen victim to vandalism and it may not be incorrect to assume we'll be seeing more of this in the future. The young men who have been charged fit the description of so many young Muslim men across the GTA. Members of Muslim organizations in school, punctual with prayers... the average Muslim guy. (The Toronto Star has a lengthy article "Schoolkids to terror suspects"... which I've included in this post. Click Expand to read it). It would be very unfortunate for the rest of us to be cast in the same light as these individuals. At the same time though, it would be unfortunate for more of these people to exist among us.

It took me almost an hour to write this post because of the mixed feelings caused by these arrests.


Schoolkids to terror suspects
Trio underwent swift transformation from popular kids to devout, depressed

Jun. 5, 2006. 11:48 AM
MICHELLE SHEPHARD AND ISABEL TEOTONIO
STAFF REPORTERS

They were the popular kids, outspoken, always getting the laughs and experiencing all the regular teenage angst.

At Mississauga's Meadowvale Secondary School, Saad Khalid, Fahim Ahmad and Zakaria Amara — Zak, to his Grade 9 pals — were close friends and though they were observant Muslims, back in 2001 they spoke mainly of girls rather than Islam.

As the four high school years passed, the three friends began to change. They became more serious, at times depressed, devout in their faith. Khalid created R.A.C., the "Religious Awareness Club," where he'd preach Islam during lunch hours in the school's drama room.

But there were still glimpses of the goofiness for which they were known. In a 2005 video made by Khalid and other friends, he spoofed the stylized Bollywood films. Khalid donned a hijab for his role as a forlorn lover and in one scene is shown running in slow motion across a field with his arms outstretched.

The movie starring 19-year-old Khalid is a jarring contrast to the images now of the three friends in prison suits, alleged by police to be members of a homegrown terrorist cell.

In a series of raids Friday night and Saturday morning, led by the RCMP's anti-terrorism task force, 17 suspects were arrested — five under the age of 18 who cannot be identified in accordance with Canadian law.

Most of the suspects are in their late teens or early 20s but the eldest two are 30 and 43. The unidentified youths attended the same Scarborough high school and allegedly knew one of the adult suspects, 19-year-old Amin Mohamed Durrani, but other details that may reveal the identities of the youths cannot be published.

The suspects come from a variety of ethnic backgrounds and the majority are Canadian citizens.

It's only the second time in Canada since the Criminal Code was amended in 2001 to include terrorism offences that charges have been laid for terrorism, and the first time that police have made arrests to stop what they allege was an impending attack on Canadian soil.

The arrests are part of a continuing, multi-national probe into suspected terrorist cells in at least seven countries, a U.S. counter-terrorism official told the Los Angeles Times.

The senior U.S. law enforcement official said authorities are combing through evidence seized during the raids to look for possible connections between the 17 suspects and at least 18 other Islamic militants who have been arrested in locations including the United States, Bangladesh, Bosnia, Britain, Denmark and Sweden.

The RCMP will say little about the case or the suspects but through sources in the Muslim community, government, police and security services, most speaking to the Star on condition of anonymity, a picture is emerging of just who these 17 are, how they're connected, and what led to the investigation.

While the arrests took Canadians by surprise, the investigation into the group began in 2004 when Canada's spy service noted the fundamentalist views espoused by local youths on various Internet sites, sources said.

The arrests were brought on by the group's alleged purchase of three tonnes of ammonium nitrate, a massive amount of fertilizer that can be used to make bombs, such as the one that killed 168 people in Oklahoma City in the 1995 attack by Timothy McVeigh.

But the Star has learned that what the group actually acquired was not ammonium nitrate, since investigators monitoring the men learned of the alleged purchase of the fertilizer and intervened before the delivery, switching the potentially deadly material with a harmless substance. After the deal with the decoy was completed, 400 officers from across the province moved in for the arrests.

It's not yet known which members of the group are accused of being involved with the purchase of the material and the RCMP has not revealed what specific charges each suspect is facing. That's expected to be listed in a Brampton court tomorrow when the suspects appear for their bail hearings.

Family members and lawyers of the accused say they're eager to hear what details police will produce, pointing to past investigations in Canada where the evidence hasn't supported the initial claims.

Sources say evidence will show the youths travelled north to a "training camp," where they wore fatigues and made a video imitating warfare, conjuring images of the propaganda videos taped by Al Qaeda at the now-destroyed camps in Afghanistan before 9/11.

At a news conference Saturday, the RCMP displayed some of the seized items allegedly found at the camp such as a pockmarked door police said was used for shooting practice.

But those close to the accused wonder if this was not simply an overreaction by authorities and the trip north nothing more than teenagers dressing up and playing paintball.

Those who knew some the suspects in the various communities where they lived, say there's no doubt there were noticeable differences in their personalities in the last two years. They became activists for the plight of Muslims worldwide and allegedly felt Muslims were being targeted unfairly in Canada.

Much of that anger, according to sources close to the investigation, was allegedly directed at the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and the group listed the Toronto headquarters of CSIS, adjacent to the CN Tower, as one of its targets.

Saad Khalid's yearbook comments asked about devotion to Islam

Many of the suspects were not devout Muslims when they were younger but later were drawn to the strict interpretation of Islam, known as Wahhabism, which is widely practised in Saudi Arabia but also has a strong following worldwide, including in Canada.

Khalid could talk of little else by the time he graduated, former classmates said. As his classmates thanked their parents, reflected about the "ups and downs" of high school life and wondered "where the four years went," in their yearbook comments, Khalid began his with an Islamic creed that Allah is the only one worthy of worship.

"(D)o you really believe in it? You do? Then prove it," he wrote.

"Before us there were many ... after us there will be none ... we are the ones ... Allahu Akbar."

By 2005, he had also become depressed. Those who knew him attributed the change to his mother's death in an accident the year before and the fact a girlfriend broke up with him.

Ahmad and Amara transferred after Grade 10 from Meadowvale to another Mississauga high school where friends say they became reclusive.

In 2005, Ahmad allegedly rented a car for two of the other suspects in the group arrested Friday night — Ali Dirie and Yasin Mohamed.

On Aug. 13, the pair was arrested at the Peace Bridge in Fort Erie as they tried to smuggle guns and ammunition from the United States. Since authorities were already watching Ahmad, when he allegedly rented the car a flag was put on the licence plate so it would be searched upon its return to Canada.

Dirie and Mohamed both pleaded guilty last October and received two-year sentences. They were charged with the new terrorism offences in the Kingston-area penitentiary where they are serving their time.

Ahmad was not charged in the incident. When the Star interviewed him earlier this year he declined to comment on the car rental, saying he told everything that needed to be said to police.

At the end of high school Amara married a classmate named Nada Farooq. They now have an 8-month-old daughter and the pair attended university — Amara at Ryerson and Farooq at the University of Toronto, a former classmate says. Amara also worked part-time at a gas station and the couple was struggling financially.

Also charged this weekend was Amara's brother-in-law, Ahmad Mustafa Ghany, who married Farooq's sister.

Ahmad, like Khalid and Amara, often prayed at an Islamic centre near their Meadowvale high school. But sometime in 2005, they met 43-year-old Qayyum Abdul Jamal and also began praying and attending classes at the Ar-Rahman Islamic Centre in Mississauga.

Immigrant families who wanted a place to meet for prayer service and where their children could learn the Qur'an set up the centre in 1999.

Since the beginning, the centre has struggled financially and was never able to hire a full-time imam or academic scholar. So, directors relied on volunteers to run and operate the centre — Jamal was one of them.

Jamal, the eldest member of the group now charged, has been a key fixture at the centre since 1999, working as a caretaker who had enough free time to go and open the doors for several daily prayer sessions. An immigrant from Karachi, Pakistan, Jamal is married to a Canadian woman who converted to Islam and has four sons.

Jamal would sometimes lead the prayers.

"(Jamal) was very popular among the children and young people" recalled one member who asked to remain anonymous. "He played basketball, went camping and went fishing with them. He would sit down and talk with them — he hung out with the youth crowd."

Although Jamal's radical Wahhabist and anti-Western views alarmed some of the centre's members, many of the older members never perceived him as a dangerous extremist.

"During the 2004 election we were trying to recruit people at the centre to get involved and (Jamal) was against it," recalled Faheem Bukhari, who used to attend the centre. "He tore down the flyers we had put up. For him, getting involved in political procedure or process was forbidden. He thought people should focus on Islam."

Although none of the elders ever thought Jamal was "recruiting" youth, some were concerned about his influence.

"They were concerned that the kids hanging around him would become isolated from society, wearing different dress, not associating with the average Joe on the street," recalled Bukhari. "I think they were more concerned with the social behaviour of the kids.