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AKRON, Ohio (AP) - Testimony in the trial of an Islamic cleric accused of lying on his application for U.S. citizenship ended Wednesday after federal prosecutors showed video footage of the defendant raising money for a suspected terrorist group. Fawaz Damra, the Palestinian-born imam of the Islamic Center of Cleveland, is charged with lying about his connections to terrorist organizations when he applied for citizenship in 1994. Damra, 41, has pleaded innocent. If convicted, he could be sentenced to up to five years in prison, stripped of his citizenship and deported. Jurors watched a 1991 video of Damra speaking at...

(CBS4) GASSVILLE, Ark. A teenager suspected of a hatchet and gun attack in a New Bedford, Mass. gay bar shot and killed a small-town police officer and the teen's female passenger before he was critically wounded in a gun battle with police Saturday, authorities said. Jacob D. Robida, 18, was shot twice in the head and "it doesn't look good right now," said Bristol district attorney Paul Walsh Jr. Walsh said the teen shot Officer Jim Sell, 56, twice with a 9 mm handgun during a traffic stop in this northern Arkansas town. About 25 miles away, Robida sped his...

Teen Wanted in Gay Bar Rampage Is Caught GASSVILLE, Ark. - A teenager suspected of a hatchet-and-gun attack in a Massachusetts gay bar shot and killed a small-town police officer and the teen's female passenger before he was critically wounded in a gun battle with police Saturday, authorities said. Jacob D. Robida, 18, was shot twice in the head and "it doesn't look good right now," said Massachusetts prosecutor Paul Walsh Jr. Walsh said the teen shot Officer Jim Sell, 56, twice during a traffic stop in this northern Arkansas town. About 25 miles away, Robida sped over spike strips...

DETROIT - A Cleveland imam convicted of hiding terrorist ties has agreed to leave the United States, ending his deportation case, his attorney and government officials said Thursday. The agreement allows Fawaz Damra to resettle in Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Sudan, Egypt or the Palestinian territories, said Greg Gagne, a spokesman for the Justice Department's Executive Office for Immigration Review. A judge has approved the agreement with the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which will decide his destination. Damra is still in federal custody, said Robert Birach, a Detroit lawyer who negotiated for him. He declined to discuss more...

Iraqis in Australia Cast First Votes in Election SYDNEY (Reuters) - Iraqis in Australia cast the first votes in their homeland's long-awaited election on Friday, and celebrated the historic moment by dancing in the streets. Exiles gathered at nine polling stations around Australia, some proudly displaying the blue ink on their fingers which proved that they had cast their ballots. "When I look at the ink on my finger -- this is a mark of freedom," said Kassim Abood, outside a polling booth in a disused furniture warehouse in western Sydney. "I didn't think I would live long enough to...

HER dusty file was one of hundreds of thousands of documents stacked in a house in a wealthy neighbourhood of Baghdad. Asma Rasheed married a pilot, lived comfortably in the presidential compound of Saddam Hussein and directed a microbiology programme that was not supposed to exist. Rasheed’s light blue folder has emerged from a huge archive seized by forces loyal to Ahmed Chalabi, the leader of the Iraqi National Congress, which opposed Saddam. The archive — a dark who’s who of Iraq — reveals the tiniest details of blandishments and humiliations by a paranoid regime that shared the Nazis’ obsession...

Ohio Imam Gets Two Months in Prison By THOMAS J. SHEERAN, Associated Press Writer AKRON, Ohio (AP) -- The leader of Ohio's largest mosque was sentenced Monday to two months in federal prison and four months of house arrest for lying about his connections to terrorist groups when he applied for U.S. citizenship. Palestinian-born Fawaz Damra, imam of the Islamic Center of Cleveland, could have received up to five years in prison on the charge of obtaining U.S. citizenship in 1994 by providing false information. Prosecutors had requested the maximum sentence, but U.S. District Judge James S. Gwin said he...

Delray, Michigan (just outside of detriot) is the home of the wicked, crazy, thug clowns, the insane clown posse. The Whole World Practically knows something about these wicked clowns, and some have known for years that people want them to die. However, every time someone plans to murder them, something bad happens to the people and icp gets away. But just recently in the past 3 weeks a man paid another person to go to Violent J's house to murder both members. the man hid in a bush for about an hour as he saw Shaggy walk in to the...

Democrats' imam supported al-Arian Chaplain who gave benediction was character witness to terror supporter The Muslim imam who gave a closing benediction at the Democratic National Convention in Boston also served as a character witness to Sami al-Arian, the Florida professor indicted by the U.S. Justice Department on 50 counts of terror-related charges. On the second day of the Democratic National Convention, Imam Yahya Hendi said the closing prayer of the night with some verses from the Quran. Yet, last July, the 9-11 commission heard testimony from terrorism expert Steven Emerson that Hendi, one of the top Islamic clerics in...

supported al-Arian This is a WorldNetDaily printer-friendly version of the article which follows. To view this item online, visit http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=39701 Thursday, July 29, 2004 Democrats' imam supported al-ArianChaplain who gave benediction was character witness to terror supporter Posted: July 29, 20049:20 a.m. Eastern © 2004 WorldNetDaily.com The Muslim imam who gave a closing benediction at the Democratic National Convention in Boston also served as a character witness to Sami al-Arian, the Florida professor indicted by the U.S. Justice Department on 50 counts of terror-related charges. On the second day of the Democratic National Convention, Imam Yahya Hendi said the closing prayer of...

© 2004 WorldNetDaily.com The Iraqi Communist Party is strongly represented in the new interim government in Baghdad and is getting U.S. taxpayer support thanks to a U.S. group led by former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, reports Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin, the premium, online intelligence newsletter published by WND. Communists celebrate transition to new government in Baghdad No group in Iraq was more vociferous in its celebration June 28 of the transition of power from the U.S.-led coalition that the ICP. Outside the party's office in Baghdad, a dancing cheering crowd waved red flags as sympathetic passing motorists sounded their horns. Iraq's...

Timeline of events in the investigation into Sami Al-Arian By The Associated Press - 1975: Sami Al-Arian, a Kuwait-born Palestinian, arrives in the United States from Egypt at age 17 to study engineering at Southern Illinois University. He later earns a doctorate in engineering from North Carolina State University. - Jan. 27, 1986: Sami Al-Arian is hired by the University of South Florida College of Engineering. - Oct. 20, 1988: Al-Arian incorporates the Islamic Concern Project, an umbrella organization that includes the Islamic Committee for Palestine, a charity devoted to Palestinian causes. - Feb. 21, 1991: Al-Arian incorporates the World...

Reds under the ruinsBy Paul Belden BAGHDAD - He still calls himself Abu Ayad, but that's only because old habits die hard. "It's my secret name," he explains with a smile, wiping his professorial spectacles against the sleeve of his neat, nerdy, button-down yellow shirt. This secret-named, hardened political fighter is, it turns out, a shy man at heart. Shy - but not embarrassed. The name and the reason behind it, may seem to be holdovers of a different era, but they were once the dead-serious necessities of political activism in this land where even the suspicion of such an...

Iraq could do much worse. If I was ever to volunteer for the role of American colonial puppet, I would hope to play my role with the same panache that Ahmad Chalabi has brought to the part. Denounced only last month by yet another anonymous "report" from the CIA and sneered at on a daily basis by the New York Times, he has either failed to be sufficiently biddable by the puppet-masters or (how simple it all seems when you think of it) has cleverly arranged to be the object of his own disinformation campaign. If it's the latter, then...

Chicago, Il, November 3,1995 ...The new leader of an Islamic terrorist organization ran an Islamic studies think tank at the University of South Florida (USF) about which the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) had raised serious concerns with university officials. Ramadan Abdallah became the leader of Islamic Jihad for Palestine, a known terrorist group that has taken responsibility for the killing of dozens of Israelis, after the assassination in Malta of Fathi Shikaki. Mr. Abdallah was the Administrative Director of the World Islam and Studies Enterprise (WISE), a think tank of the Islamic Committee for Palestine (ICP). ADL has been monitoring the ...

<p>The Clinton administration shut down a 1995 investigation of Islamic charities, concerned that a public probe would expose Saudi Arabia's suspected ties to a global money-laundering operation that raised millions for anti-Israel terrorists, federal officials told The Washington Times.</p> <p>Law enforcement authorities and others close to the aborted investigation said the State Department pressed federal officials to pull agents off the previously undisclosed probe after the charities were targeted in the diversion of cash to groups that fund terrorism.</p>