THE DAILY BLADE: The Last Of The Red-Hot Virginia Jihadi Lovers
U.S. District Judge Claude Hilton sentenced Ali Asad Chandia, 29, to five years in prison for providing assistance to a terrorist organization known as the "Virginia jihad network," which used paintball games to train for a holy war. The Washington Times reports:
[Chandia] was found guilty of “serving as a driver for Mohammed Ajmal Khan, a senior military leader of the Lashkar-e-Taiba, which the U.S. government designated as a terrorist organization in December 2001. He also was convicted for assisting Khan in procuring military equipment for Lashkar and giving safe harbor to Khan during Khan's visits to the United States in 2002 and 2003.
The former third-grade teacher at the Al-Huda School, a Muslim school in in College Park, MD, was the last of 11 convicted "Virginia jihadists" to be sentenced; the others convicted in the conspiracy to “prepare for and engage in violent jihad” against foreign targets in Kashmir, the Philippines and Chechnya, received terms that ranged from 46 months to life. According to the original indictment:
Chandia was among a dozen men who conspired and trained at shooting ranges and elsewhere in Maryland and Virginia with AK-47 assault rifles, other military weapons and equipment, and paintball guns beginning in 2000. Some training, including military tactics, also took place at the Quantico Marine Corps base in Prince William County.
The Washington Times notes that nine of the 11 were U.S. citizens:
Then-U.S. Attorney Paul J. McNulty, whose Alexandria office prosecuted the case, said the men had met, plotted and recruited for violent jihad “right here in this community, 10 miles from Capitol Hill, in the streets of Northern Virginia.”
Mr. McNulty, now deputy attorney general, called the indictments a “stark reminder” that terrorists are active in the United States and seek to exploit America's freedom to recruit and position themselves for new attacks.
So, what do our friends at the Council of American-Islamic Relations CAIR) have to say about all this? Not a damn thing. As usual, they’re too busy turning over every rock they can find looking for anti-Muslim bias – instead, the organization put out this press release, “CAIR Calls For FBI Probe of MN Mosque Arson.” It remains to be seen whether this was, indeed, a case of arson (as with so many of CAIR’s accusations, there’s often smoke but no arson), but The Stiletto is flabberghasted that CAIR does not regard jihadi training on American soil as evidence of anti-American bias and condemn what is a clear-cut case of home-grown Muslim terrorism.
Meanwhile, columnist Douglas MacKinnon argues that “blind adherence” to political correctness is deterring the government and the media from taking a hard look at the threat of Islamofascist terrorism here:
Talk with the British government, and at least off the record, they will tell you they have a serious and growing problem with “home grown Muslim fanatics.” …
If home grown Islamists ready to kill in the name of God, are on the rise in
[I]f we accept the estimate that there are 6 million Muslim-Americans in our country, and 99% of them are law abiding citizens who are loyal to our nation, then that means that there may be – may be -- 1% who might put a twisted version of Islamic extremism before the wellbeing of their fellow Americans. When you stop to think that 1% of 6 million is 60,000 individuals, that then seems like a very intimidating one percent.
Let’s go to the good side of extreme and say that 99.9 percent of all Muslim-Americans would never turn on their own government. That would still leave a questionable 1/10th of one percent – or 6,000 potential terrorist sympathizers. Even if we carve in granite that 99.9 percent of Muslim-Americans are beyond suspicion, the left wing of our media and government will still not let us question the motives of that 1/10th of one percent. …
During the “war” between
[T]hese were your fellow citizens cheering a terrorist organization that has already proudly killed hundreds of Americans. If they would cheer such a despicable group, what else might they do for them or
If any organization put together a resource guide to help keep communities safe from Muslim-American terrorists - who are indeed in our midst, as the nine Virginia jihadis prove - CAIR would immediately put out a press release condemning the action as evidence of an “anti-Muslim backlash.” Never mind that CAIR has already put together a similar resourse guide, “Muslim Community Safety Kit,” to keep Mohammedans safe from the the non-existent anti-Muslim backlash by American Christians and Jews that they keep crying wolf about.
Update:
The Washington Times reports that the Mayor Pro Tem of Farmers Branch, TX, Ben Robinson, would like police officers who stop suspected illegal aliens to verify residency papers submit copies of them to immigration officials. Deputy Mayor Pro Tem Tim O'Hare said the city ought to make it a crime for landlords to rent or sell property to illegal aliens and impose fines on businesses that hire them. These proposals are similar to those that officials in Hazelton, PA, recently voted to approve.
A recent city council meeting where town officials declared their intentions to introduce the proposals was roiled by protests, both pro and con. Pros carried signs that read, “O'Hare, a Politician With Guts”; one elderly woman who drove 30 miles to attend the meeting said, “They don't have any rights until they become citizens. This isn't what America is supposed to be.” Cons called the proposals “racist”; one, former president of United Latin American Citizens, urged the crowd, “Let's bring a million more Mexicans to Farmers Branch and see how it works.” The town has just 27,500 residents, according to the 2000 census, 33 percent of them are Hispanic.
For her part, senator, Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) takes a dim view of such local initiatives, maintaining that it is up to Congress to pass immigration legislation, and not the purview of individual cities.
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