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SNIPPET: "For all his public activity, Bray has rarely, if ever, discussed his life story in detail. His own MAS biography offers vague descriptions of his work as "a long time civil and human rights advocate." A charismatic African-American convert to Islam, Bray spent this entire decade working for Islamist organizations. Prior to joining MAS, Bray was political director of the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC). Those jobs have helped him build a growing public profile and given him access to politicians and policy makers. And that may explain his reluctance to discuss his life before political activism. The Investigative...

Now that Congress has recessed, and since the conventions aren’t for a couple of weeks, Thursday’s The Situation Room turned back to the "hot" issue of what many liberals are calling on congressional Democrats to do: arrest and lock-up Karl Rove for his failure to testify on the issue of the firing of U.S. attorneys in late 2006. CNN correspondent Jim Acosta, as part of a report on this possible move by the Democrats, conducted a search for the supposed jail inside the U.S. Capitol. He also addressed the little-used power of the legislature to arrest and try government officials...

Alexandria, Va. (AP) -- The Justice Department may have hoodwinked a defendant in a high-profile terrorism case into thinking his plea bargain would protect him from further prosecutions, a federal judge said Monday. Monday's hearing in U.S. District Court was the latest in which Judge Leonie Brinkema questioned the Justice Department's tactics in pursuing a criminal contempt case against former professor Sami Al-Arian, once accused of being a leading Palestinian terrorist. Brinkema gave Al-Arian's lawyers 10 days to file papers seeking dismissal of the case on the grounds that prosecutors failed to keep promises made under the plea bargain. She...

ALEXANDRIA, VA - A federal judge on Friday cleared the way for Sami Al-Arian to stand trial for criminal contempt, ruling there is an "insufficient legal basis" for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad supporter's claim of selective government prosecution. U.S. District Court Judge Leonie Brinkema set a March 9 jury trial date for Al-Arian.

A federal jury in Dallas on Monday dealt the Stealth Jihad initiative in the United States a crushing defeat: it found five former officials of an Islamic charity, the Holy Land Foundation (HLF), guilty of funneling at least $12 million of the charity’s funds to the jihad terror group Hamas. The notorious “Muslim civil rights” group, the Council on American Islamic Relations, is involved as well, since Ghassan Elashi, a founding director of CAIR as well as founder of the group’s Texas chapter, was among those found guilty; Elashi and his co-defendants face prison sentences of up to twenty years...

Ahmed Mohamed, one half of the Goose Creek two, received the maximum sentence yesterday for creating a jihad video that was to be used by Muslim “martyrs” fighting American soldiers in Arab countries. He and his apologists still insist on painting Mohamed as a regular college guy. The judge didn’t buy it. Good: ~~~ Former University of South Florida student Ahmed Mohamed received a maximum 15-year federal prison sentence Thursday for providing material support to terrorists. In court, U.S. District Judge Steven D. Merryday pondered the 27-year-old’s potential aloud, gazing at the former engineering doctoral student and teaching assistant who...

Islamic leaders tied by federal investigators to the radical Muslim Brotherhood in America – including one under active investigation for alleged terror-financing – have recently donated to Sen. Barack Obama's campaign for president, according to Federal Election Commission records reviewed by WND. Jamal M. Barzinji earlier this year gave Obama $1,000, a gift that records show has not been returned. Other Democratic candidates, including Rep. Jim Moran, have refunded donations from Barzinji since federal agents raided his Virginia home and offices in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. Obama's top Muslim adviser resigned earlier this month over controversy surrounding his...

I never give time frames, because you never know where you'll have sufficient evidence to go public with a prosecution, " Mueller said.

Al-Qaeda Draws New Recruits Via Internet Al-Qaeda is using the Internet to recruit vulnerable young people to its terrorist network, according to a programme aired on Saudi Arabian TV late on Tuesday. Umm Osama, the founder of al-Qaeda's first women-only website, al-Khansa, joined several others on the programme to discuss how they renounced jihadist ideology. Among those who sought a response to this question was an imam from the Medina mosque, Saleh Ibn Awad al-Mudamsi, and the father of a young al-Qaeda suspect held in an Iraqi prison. Read More Qaeda Targets U.S. Oil Interests in North Africa U.S....

The Hunt for American al Qaeda The United States is turning up the heat in the hunt for the California boy turned al Qaeda operative, Adam Gadahn, who has been charged with treason and is believed to be hiding in Afghanistan. If caught and convicted, Gadahn could face the death penalty. The State Department along with the Department of Diplomatic Security announced the beginning of a publicity campaign in Afghanistan urging locals to provide any information on Gadahn's whereabouts, with a reward if the information leads to his capture. Radio advertisements with information concerning the $1 million reward have...

Sami al-Arian’s fondest wish is to be deported from the United States to the Palestinian territories. The US government has other plans, however, and will keep him in prison until he testifies to connections between charity front groups and terrorists. The former Florida professor claims he has immunity from further investigations, but somehow his side forgot to commit it to paper: Former university professor Sami al-Arian wants to finish serving his prison sentence for a terrorism-related crime next month so that he can be deported to the Palestinian territories. But the Bush administration is threatening to keep him behind bars...

Gainesville -- Officials at Mar-Jac Poultry said they were shocked to find out Thursday that federal officials suspect the company might have ties to terrorist funding. Company Vice President Doug Carnes said at least a half-dozen U.S. Customs agents spent all day Wednesday gathering financial records and charitable contribution files. They were "real nice, professional and complimentary," he said, but they didn't disclose the nature of their visit. It was only on Thursday that Carnes was alerted by company officials in Virginia as to what the agents were looking for. "I'm shocked. I'm in disbelief. I've worked for them for...

A former Florida college professor who pleaded guilty to aiding a Palestinian terrorist group was not immune from a subpoena forcing him to testify in an unrelated probe of Muslim charities, an appeals court ruled Friday. Sami Al-Arian, 50, had argued the terms of the plea agreement exempted him from testifying before a grand jury in an investigation of Islamic charities in Virginia. A federal judge disagreed and found Al-Arian guilty of contempt when he refused to testify. The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied Al-Arian's appeal Friday, ruling that federal prosecutors did not violate the plea agreement by...

Does America need a terrorist financier to secure its “freedom”? Sami al-Arian thinks so. His National Coalition to Protect Political Freedom poses as a watchdog for the Constitution, but he has focused his lobbying efforts on repealing anti-terrorist legislation. While Sami al-Arian himself has been arrested for being a prime financier for Palestinian Islamic Jihad (and likely one of its three founders), his political movement continues to threaten homeland security. Al-Arian founded the National Coalition to Protect Political Freedom (NCPPF) in 1997 as a reaction to the Anti-Terrorism Act of 1996. The coalition’s stated goal “is to help change the...

Temple Terrace, Florida - One week after USF students Youseff Megahed and Ahmed Mohamed made their first court appearance in South Carolina, authorities still haven't said exactly what material was in the trunk of Megahed's car. The students told deputies it was fireworks, the prosecutor called it a pipe bomb. But after visiting him in South Carolina, the Megahed family says they're even more convinced of his innocence. Mariam Megahed, Defendant’s Sister: “Youssef promised us he didn't have any bad intentions and once the true nature of the evidence is displayed, he will be exonerated.” On Sunday, real estate investor...

Alec "the Bloviator" Baldwin has a new bosom buddy: Beltway Republican strategist Grover Norquist. The Bush-bashing actor-turned-activist and the Muslim vote-courting political organizer joined together at a Washington, D.C.-area conference last weekend to perpetuate bald lies about the Patriot Act and to oppose the "repressive" War on Terror (repressing terrorist suspects apparently being a bad thing). Baldwin and Norquist's panel, titled "Strange Bedfellows," was sponsored by the ultraliberal group People For the American Way. When PFAW head and panel participant Ralph Neas ranted about the lack of judicial and congressional oversight of the Justice Department's terror investigations, the audience...

Raleigh, N.C. (AP) -- Prison workers soon might force feed a former university professor who has been on a hunger strike for six weeks to protest his imprisonment for refusing to testify about Palestinian charities, his lawyer said Wednesday. Sami al-Arian, a Palestinian who taught computer science at the University of South Florida, stopped eating Jan. 22 in objection to a judge's decision to hold him indefinitely because he refused to testify before a grand jury. He has lost more than 40 pounds on his water-only diet and is so weak that he needs a wheelchair, said his wife, Nahla...

One aspect of life that has been unfathomable to me is the continued support the left in America gives to CAIR, the Council for American-Islamic Relations. I recognize that their initial support came from the honest belief that CAIR was a civil rights organization dedicated only to protecting the rights of America’s Muslims, but, by now, even the most close-minded leftist must admit the terrorist activities of this organization.

Jihadi Journalist: The Real Peter Jennings By Debbie Schlussel While the rest of the world is blindly singing the praises of Peter Jennings, here's a reality check: Peter Jennings did more for the cause of Islamic terrorism than any media figure today. And that's nothing to celebrate, honor, or even memorialize. Before there was Al Jazeerah, there was Peter Jennings. From the beginning of Jennings career until his death, Jennings' biased coverage went beyond the pale, bending over backward in "understanding" the terrorists who hate us-- from seeing "their side" when he covered the seige and then murder of innocent...

The attacks on US targets culminating in the September 11 suicide hijackings were only a fraction of the onslaught planned by Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida, it emerged yesterday. Over the past three years, US intelligence detected plots against US embassies in 14 countries, mostly in Asia and Africa, and there were over 600 more "credible threats" of attacks. Some were thwarted by arrests or stepped up security. Others appear to have been suspended or may still be pending. The global extent of al-Qaida's terrorist ambitions is revealed in a new book by Peter Bergen, CNN's terrorism analyst, who interviewed ...

American universities rank among the best in the world, but they also boast another, more dubious distinction: They are home to some of the world’s most radical academics. Last month, one of these select individuals, UC Berkeley professor Hatem Bazian, brought his hate-filled show to two extremist Islamic Centers in South Florida. Both of these institutions are in the process of building large-scale mosques in their respective cities. And, given that their guest had previously called for attacks on the United States, the question naturally arose: Were these institutions looking to make friends in the community or to start a holy war?Past...

Civil Liberties for Terrorists But Not for American TroopsBy Jacob LaksinFrontPageMagazine.com | June 21, 2006 In recent years the ranks of alleged victims championed by civil libertarians on the political Left have swollen to include everyone from the terrorist detainees at Guantanamo Bay, to anti-American radicals, to environmentalist ultras and illegal immigrants. But there’s at least one group ineligible for victim status under the legal Left’s guidelines: American troops.  This seems to be the lesson of the “Camp Pendleton Eight.” A group of seven Marines and one Navy corpsman, they are currently being held--reportedly under excessively harsh conditions--at the Camp...

A co-defendant of a former college professor accused of terrorist ties has been released from jail and deported, more than five months after his trial ended, his attorney and federal officials said Wednesday. Sameeh Hammoudeh's attorney had sued the government this year to try to expedite the deportation, and a federal judge had given immigration officials until Wednesday to deport him or explain why they continued to hold him. Federal officials Tuesday took Hammoudeh, 46, to Jordan, where he crossed into the West Bank to be reunited with his wife and six children, said his attorney, Stephen Bernstein. "He's home...

Tampa -- Former college professor Sami Al-Arian will appeal a judge's decision to sentence him to additional prison time for his role in providing support to a terrorist group, federal court records show. Attorney C. Peter Erlinder filed the notice of appeal to the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday. A federal jury last year acquitted Al-Arian of eight counts of aiding the Palestinian Islamic Jihad while deadlocking on nine other counts. Instead of facing a second trial on the remaining counts, Al-Arian pleaded guilty to one count of providing services to members of the PIJ, labeled a...

A federal judge yesterday lambasted a former Florida college professor, Sami Al-Arian, as a liar and "master manipulator," before sentencing him to nearly five years in prison for providing support to a Middle Eastern terrorist group, Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Under a plea deal finalized last month, Al-Arian, 48, agreed to admit guilt and accept a possible sentence of 46 to 57 months and eventual deportation from America. Prosecutors agreed to join defense attorneys in recommending a sentence at the low end of the range, but the judge, James Moody Jr., ignored those suggestions and imposed the maximum sentence allowed by...

TAMPA -- A judge on Monday sentenced former professor Sami Al-Arian to another year and a half in prison before he will be deported in his terrorism conspiracy case. Al-Arian, 48, was sentenced to four years and nine months, but he will get credit for the three years and three months he has already served while being held before and after his trial. His lawyer, Linda Moreno, asked the judge to release her client now, but the judge refused and called Al-Arian ``a master manipulator.''

TAMPA, Florida (Reuters) - Former Florida university professor Sami al-Arian has pleaded guilty to aiding the Palestinian group Islamic Jihad and agreed to be deported, U.S. officials said on Monday. ADVERTISEMENT Al-Arian and three co-defendants were charged in 2003 with helping the group carry out attacks in Israel. In December, a federal jury in Tampa found al-Arian not guilty on eight charges and failed to reach a verdict on nine others after a six-month trial. Prosecutors, whose failure to convict al-Arian after the jury trial was seen as a stiff blow to the U.S. government's attempts to prosecute terrorism suspects,...

After years of denial, Sami Al-Arian has finally admitted it: he has pleaded guilty to a charge of “conspiracy to make or receive contributions of funds to or for the benefit of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a Specially Designated Terrorist” organization. He has agreed to accept deportation. In his 2002 defense of Al-Arian, Eric Boehlert wrote: “The al-Arian story reveals what happens when journalists, abandoning their role as unbiased observers, lead an ignorant, alarmist crusade against suspicious foreigners who in a time of war don't have the power of the press or public sympathy to fight back.” Reality is just the...

WASHINGTON, April 17 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Former University of South Florida Professor Sami Al-Arian has pleaded guilty to a charge of conspiring to provide services to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), a specially designated terrorist organization, in violation of U.S. law, the Department of Justice announced today. In a closed proceeding before a federal magistrate at U.S. District Court in the Middle District of Florida last week, Al- Arian pleaded guilty to Count Four of the indictment against him -- a charge of conspiracy to make or receive contributions of funds, goods or services to or for the benefit of...

Federal authorities have decided to deport a former University of South Florida professor and long-time Palestinian rights activist after failing to convict him on charges he helped finance terrorist attacks in Israel. Two lawyers familiar with the case say Sami Al-Arian has reached an agreement with prosecutors to plead guilty to a lesser charge and be deported. The lawyers spoke on condition of anonymity because the agreement had not been made public by the court. It isn't clear where Al-Arian will be sent. Al-Arian has been in jail since a Tampa jury acquitted him in December on eight of the...

As we pointed out earlier, Ann Coulter is in hot water because she registered to vote at a different address than where she lives. Not in a different state, or even different city, but a different precinct. Hardly the massive type of voter fraud elsewhere that should be looked into, but isn't. And, as we explained, she has legitimate reasons (ie., stalkers) for not wanting her real address in a public record (ie., voter registration documents). Now, according to the Palm Beach Post, Palm Beach officials are investigating Ann and even considering referring her to Florida's Attorney General for possible...

On Wednesday, January 18, I received an e-mail from someone identifying himself as “Ahmed.” He wrote to me that he was a “Muslim activist” and that he wanted me to come on his radio show to discuss my work, or, in his words, “to give [my] side of the story.” In doing a simple web search on his e-mail address, it turned out that this individual was none other than the Director of Communications for the Chicago chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), Ahmed Rehab. While I didn’t know his motives in contacting me, I had recalled when...

Bin Laden cannot be named in Damra trial Judge fears mention would inflame jurors Tuesday, June 15, 2004 John Caniglia Plain Dealer Reporter A federal judge, fearing the mention of Osama bin Laden would prejudice jurors, barred prosecutors from bringing up the terrorist's name during imam Fawaz Damra's trial, which begins today in Akron. Damra, the leader of the Islamic Center of Cleveland, is accused of concealing his ties to terrorism on immigration forms in 1994. If convicted, he could be sentenced to up to five years in prison and deported. U.S. District Judge James Gwin's decision helped Damra, 41,...

Imam Fawaz Damra helped lay the groundwork for an organization that ultimately merged into al-Qaida in the late 1980s. He was an unindicted co-conspirator of the terrorists who bombed the World Trade Center in 1993. And he passionately raised money for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which killed dozens of Jews in Israel during the 1990s. Yet Damra, spiritual leader to thousands of Muslims in Northeast Ohio, seemed to fly comfortably beneath the radar of U.S. terror investigators - until Tuesday. FBI agents swooped in on the Palestinian cleric at his Strongsville home, arresting him on a relatively minor - and...

DePaul University is rapidly becoming ground zero in the battle to reform academia’s corrupted political culture. For the third time in less than a year the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) has publicly rebuked the university for its politically motivated abridgment of free speech, this time for shutting down an anti-affirmative action bake sale and threatening to punish one of the organizers for violation of a newly instituted anti-discrimination policy. The DePaul Conservative Alliance set up a table in the Student Center where they were selling cookies and suggesting differing prices based on race, ethnicity and gender. It...

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...

TAMPA - Hatem Fariz, co-defendant of Sami Al-Arian, asked the federal court Thursday to dismiss the remaining eight counts of the conspiracy indictment against him. Fariz was acquitted on 25 counts on Dec. 6. When jurors could not reach a verdict on eight counts, U.S. District Judge James Moody Jr. declared a mistrial for those counts. Prosecutors have not yet said whether they will retry him. Fariz, who lives in Spring Hill, is free on bond. Al-Arian, a former University of South Florida professor, was acquitted on eight counts. He remains in a Hillsborough jail while prosecutors decide whether to...

Sami's Guardian Angel By Paul Sperry FrontPageMagazine.com | December 9, 2005 "I didn't see the evidence," explained one male juror who this week voted to acquit former Florida professor Sami al-Arian on charges he conspired to help Palestinian terrorists kill Israelis and Americans. Don't blame federal prosecutors for that. They did the best they could with the reams of circumstantial evidence they had, which was powerful enough by itself to sway even al-Arian's defense team to admit he had at least "some affiliation" with Palestinian Islamic Jihad and may have cheered news of the terror group's attacks. But prosecutors could...

My friend, Michael Eisenstadt, dedicated his life, among other things, to seeing terrorist leader Sami Al-Arian face justice. In September, Mike, spokesman for Tampa's Jewish community, died of lung cancer. While his passing is a source of great sadness, I'm glad Mike didn't get to see Al-Arian's acquittal, Tuesday. It was a sad day in America, but not one that was unexpected. At least by me. Everyone predicted that the jury would throw the book at the man who was a founder of terrorist group Islamic Jihad, and ran its worldwide headquarters from his University of South Florida offices. But...

"I didn't see the evidence," explained one male juror who this week voted to acquit former Florida professor Sami al-Arian on charges he conspired to help Palestinian terrorists kill Israelis and Americans. Don't blame federal prosecutors for that. They did the best they could with the reams of circumstantial evidence they had, which was powerful enough by itself to sway even al-Arian's defense team to admit he had at least "some affiliation" with Palestinian Islamic Jihad and may have cheered news of the terror group's attacks. But prosecutors could have had an open-and-shut case if it weren't for a reluctant...

Why Al-Arian Walked By Debbie SchlusselFrontPageMagazine.com | December 9, 2005My friend, Michael Eisenstadt, dedicated his life, among other things, to seeing terrorist leader Sami Al-Arian face justice. In September, Mike, spokesman for Tampa's Jewish community, died of lung cancer. While his passing is a source of great sadness, I'm glad Mike didn't get to see Al-Arian's acquittal, Tuesday.It was a sad day in America, but not one that was unexpected. At least by me. Everyone predicted that the jury would throw the book at the man who was a founder of terrorist group Islamic Jihad, and ran its worldwide...

Former college professor Sami Al-Arian may have won in court this week, but his future is still murky as he awaits the U.S. government's next move, which could include deportation. Al-Arian was acquitted Tuesday of eight of the 17 federal terrorism-conspiracy charges against him, with the jury deadlocking on the rest. The verdicts were a stunning defeat for federal authorities who had been assembling the complex case against him for a decade. Al-Arian, 47, remains in jail, where he's been since his February 2003 indictment, while the federal government decides whether to retry him on the deadlocked charges, which include...

There it is. Turn on the news it should be on right about now. His co-conspirators too.

TAMPA -- Jurors in the terrorism conspiracy trial of former University of South Florida professor Sami Al-Arian reached verdicts Monday for two of the defendants but told the judge they were deadlocked on the fate of the other two. U.S. District Judge James S. Moody Jr. ordered jurors to return to discussions to see if they could get verdicts on all counts. Moody sealed the two completed verdict forms and didn't say which two defendants were in question. Jurors returned to deliberations but stopped for the day at 4 p.m. They'll resume today.

TAMPA - Jurors for the federal trial of Sami Al-Arian and three co-defendants began deliberating Tuesday, after 22 weeks in court. To give them more room and some exercise, U.S. District Judge James S. Moody told them they could move between their jury room and the courtroom, where dozens of boxes of evidence sit. This gives them a larger workspace, so they're not confined to the 16- by 18-foot jury room, where they spent much of their time during the four-day-a-week trial. During this time, they brought things to make it more homey: jigsaw puzzles of rural scenes, playing cards,...

TAMPA, Fla. - A former professor was described by his attorneys Tuesday as a crusader for the Palestinian cause whose inflammatory words have been twisted by federal prosecutors intent on proving he is a terrorist. In shared closing arguments, attorneys Linda Moreno and William Moffitt said Sami Al-Arian did nothing but speak, write and publish strong words critical of the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories and advocate a better life for its people. "It has been a prosecution of his ideas and his beliefs, and that, ladies and gentlemen, is un-American," Moreno told the jury. Al-Arian, 47, and three...

TAMPA, Fla. - A fired college professor acted as a "crime boss" for Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a murderous gang that operated like the Mafia, a federal prosecutor told a jury Monday. Although Sami Al-Arian and three co-defendants are not charged with killing anyone, they conspired to bring about attacks and are just as guilty under the law as the suicide bombers who carried them out, prosecutor Cherie Krigsman said in closing arguments. "The men of the PIJ you got to know in this case, they didn't strap bombs to their body," she said. "They leave that to somebody else." Al-Arian,...

TAMPA, Fla. (AP) - A fired university professor accused of supporting terrorists denied ties to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad in a filmed 1994 interview, which was played at his trial Wednesday. During the interview for a PBS documentary on Middle East terror groups operating in the United States, Sami Al-Arian was asked if he had ties to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. "There was never an affiliation," he replied. Prosecutors have presented intercepted phone calls and letters and played videotaped speeches that they say show Al-Arian, a former University of South Florida professor, was the Palestinian Islamic Jihad's top official in...

TAMPA - A heart-breaking last will and testament and a letter vital to the prosecution's case were quietly entered into evidence Thursday in the trial of Sami Al-Arian and three other defendants. Without mentioning what they were, federal prosecutor Alexis Collins asked the judge to accept T-516 and T-402 into evidence. With those meaningless labels, two documents passed into the public record like a death notice slipped under a door. Their subject: martyrdom. One last will and testament came from Adel Kamel Daher, a 26-year-old Palestinian who was gunned down by Israeli soldiers after attacking an Israeli convoy with two...

TAMPA - Jurors in the federal trial of Sami Al-Arian got a gripping introduction to the defendant Tuesday. The former University of South Florida professor has not yet spoken in court, but he said plenty Tuesday when the prosecution played a videotape of a rally in Cleveland in 1991. As Al-Arian took the stage, he was introduced as head of the "active arm" of the Islamic Jihad movement in Palestine. Al-Arian then stepped to the microphone and launched an emotional appeal for money and backing for battles and martyrdom in the occupied territories of Israel. The tape is not new....