Thanks to a group of writers and investigators – Douglas Hagmann, Bill Krayer, Michael Travis, Paul Williams – terrorist training camps in the US have been exposed.

Even the Department of Homeland Security must know now that they exist and what they’re about.

Read about them here, where you’ll find a full and scary description of one in particular called Islamberg, established in a forest on the outskirts of Hancock, New York.

Islamberg is a branch of Muslims of the Americas Inc., a tax-exempt organization formed in 1980 by Pakistani cleric Sheikh Mubarak Ali Gilani, who … has been directly linked by court documents to Jamaat ul-Fuqra or “community of the impoverished,” an organization that seeks to “purify” Islam through violence.

Though primarily based in Lahore, Pakistan, Jamaat ul-Fuqra has operational headquarters in New York and openly recruits through various social service organizations in the U.S., including the prison system. Members live in hamaats or compounds, such as Islamberg, where they agree to abide by the laws of Jamaat ul-Fuqra, which are considered to be above local, state and federal authority.

Additional hamaats have been established in Hyattsville, Maryland; Red House, Virginia; Falls Church, Virginia; Macon, Georgia; York, South Carolina; Dover, Tennessee; Buena Vista, Colorado; Talihina, Oklahoma; Tulane Country, California; Commerce, California; and Onalaska, Washington. Others are being built, including an expansive facility in Sherman, Pennsylvania.

Before becoming a citizen of Islamberg or any of the other Fuqra compounds, the recruits …  are compelled to sign an oath that reads: “I shall always hear and obey, and whenever given the command, I shall readily fight for Allah’s sake.”

In the past, thousands of members of the U.S. branches of Jamaat ul-Fuqra traveled to Pakistan for paramilitary training, but encampments, such as Islamberg, are now capable of providing boot-camp training so raw recruits are no longer required to travel abroad amidst the increased scrutiny of post 9/11.

Over the years, numerous members of Jamaat ul-Fuqra have been convicted in US courts of such crimes as conspiracy to commit murder, firebombing, gun smuggling, and workers’ compensation fraud. Others remain leading suspects in criminal cases throughout the country, including ten unsolved assassinations and seventeen fire-bombings between 1979 and 1990. …

In 2001, a resident of a California compound was charged with first-degree murder in the shooting of a sheriff’s deputy; another was charged with gun-smuggling, and twenty-four members of the Red House community were convicted of firearms violations.

By 2004 federal investigators uncovered evidence that linked both the DC “sniper killer” John Allen Muhammed and “Shoe Bomber” Richard Reid to the group and reports surfaced that Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl was captured and beheaded in the process of attempting to obtain an interview with Sheikh Gilani in Pakistan.

Even though Jamaat ul-Fuqra has been involved in terror attacks and sundry criminal activities, recruited thousands of members from federal and state penal systems, and appears to be operating paramilitary facilities for militant Muslims, it remains to be placed on the official US Terror Watch List. On the contrary, it continues to operate, flourish, and expand as a legitimate nonprofit, tax-deductible charity.

Why? Because that’s what the US government wants it to do and be. Is there any other possible explanation?

The following is an email by Mark Litvak which is going round America today, forwarded from one recipient to another, informing people about a hugely significant judgment that we otherwise would not hear about since the mainstream media chose not to report it. (Or if they did, not prominently enough for anyone to remember.) Why do they not want us to know about it? Are they for terrorism? Are they against freedom? Do they ask themselves these questions? What are their answers?  

Remember the guy who got on a plane with a bomb built into his shoe and tried to

light it?

       Did you know his trial is over?

      Did you know he was sentenced?

      Did you see/hear any of the judge’s comments on TV or Radio?

       Didn’t think so.!!!

    Everyone should hear what the judge had to say.

  ————————————————————————–

         Ruling by Judge William Young, US District Court.

     Prior to sentencing, the Judge asked the defendant if he had anything to

say..  His response: After admitting his guilt to the court for the record, Reid

also admitted his ‘allegiance to Osama bin Laden, to Islam, and to the

religion of Allah,’ defiantly stating, ‘I think I will not apologize for

my actions,’ and told the court ‘I am at war with your country.’

     Judge Young then delivered the statement quoted below:

 

     January 30, 2003, United States vs. Reid.

     Judge Young:   ‘Mr. Richard C. Reid, hearken now to the sentence the

Court imposes upon you.

     On counts 1, 5 and 6 the Court sentences you to life in prison in the

custody of the United States Attorney General.  On counts 2, 3, 4 and 7, the

Court sentences you to 20 years in prison on each count, the sentence on each

count to run consecutively.  (That’s 80 years.)

     On count 8 the Court sentences you to the mandatory 30 years again, to be

served consecutively to the 80 years just imposed.  The Court imposes upon you

for each of the eight counts a fine of $250,000 that’s an aggregate fine of

$2 million.  The Court accepts the government’s recommendation with respect

to restitution and orders restitution in the amount of $298.17 to Andre Bousquet

and $5,784 to American Airlines.

     The Court imposes upon you an $800 special assessment. The Court imposes

upon you five years supervised release simply because the law requires it. But

the life sentences are real life sentences so I need go no further.

     This is the sentence that is provided for by our statutes.  It is a fair

and just sentence.  It is a righteous sentence.

     Now, let me explain this to you.  We are not afraid of you or any of your

terrorist co-conspirators, Mr. Reid.  We are Americans.  We have been through

the fire before.  There is too much war talk here and I say that to everyone

with the utmost respect.  Here in this court, we deal with individuals as

individuals and care for individuals as individuals.  As human beings, we reach

out for justice.

     You are not an enemy combatant.  You are a terrorist. You are not a soldier

in any war.  You are a terrorist.  To give you that reference, to call you a

soldier, gives you far too much stature. Whether the officers of government do

it or your attorney does it, or if you think you are a soldier.  You are

not—– you are a terrorist.  And we do not negotiate with terrorists.  We do

not meet with terrorists.  We do not sign documents with terrorists.  We hunt

them down one by one and bring them to justice.

     So war talk is way out of line in this court.  You are a big fellow. But

you are not that big.  You’re no warrior.  I’ve known warriors. You are

a terrorist.  A species of criminal that is guilty of multiple attempted

murders.  In a very real sense, State Trooper Santiago had it right when you

first were taken off that plane and into custody and you wondered where the

press and the TV crews were, and he said: ‘You’re no big deal.’

     You are no big deal.

     What your able counsel and what the equally able United States attorneys

have grappled with and what I have as honestly as I know how tried to grapple

with, is why you did something so horrific.  What was it that led you here to

this courtroom today?

     I have listened respectfully to what you have to say. And I ask you to

search your heart and ask yourself what sort of unfathomable hate led you to do

what you are guilty and admit you are guilty of doing?  And, I have an answer

for you.  It may not satisfy you, but as I search this entire record, it comes

as close to understanding as I know.

     It seems to me you hate the one thing that to us is most precious. You hate

our freedom.  Our individual freedom.  Our individual freedom to live as we

choose, to come and go as we choose, to believe or not believe as we

individually choose.  Here, in this society, the very wind carries freedom. It

carries it everywhere from sea to shining sea.  It is because we prize

individual freedom so much that you are here in this beautiful courtroom. So

that everyone can see, truly see, that justice is administered fairly,

individually, and discretely.  It is for freedom’s sake that your lawyers

are striving so vigorously on your behalf, have filed appeals, will go on in

their representation of you before other judges.

     We Americans are all about freedom.  Because we all know that the way we

treat you, Mr. Reid, is the measure of our own liberties.  Make no mistake

though.  It is yet true that we will bear any burden; pay any price, to preserve

our freedoms.  Look around this courtroom.  Mark it well.  The world is not

going to long remember what you or I say here.  The day after tomorrow, it will

be forgotten, but this, however, will long endure.

     Here in this courtroom and courtrooms all across America , the American

people will gather to see that justice, individual justice, justice, not war,

individual justice is in fact being done.  The very President of the United

States through his officers will have to come into courtrooms and lay out

evidence on which specific matters can be judged and juries of citizens will

gather to sit and judge that evidence democratically, to mold and shape and

refine our sense of justice.

     See that flag, Mr. Reid?  That’s the flag of the United States of

America .  That flag will fly there long after this is all forgotten. That flag

stands for freedom.  And it always will.

     Mr. Custody Officer.  Stand him down.

 

     So, how much of this Judge’s comments did we hear on our TV sets?  We

need more judges like Judge Young, but that’s another subject.  Pass this

around.  Everyone should and needs to hear what this fine judge had to say.

Powerful words that strike home…