Syrier Radwan al-Issar opgepakt + background info

http://intel.web-log.nl/log/3022144

! 'Al-I. zit in Syrische gevangenis'
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Door onze correspondent HARALD DOORNBOS

DAMASCUS - De geestelijk leider van het terroristische Hofstadnetwerk, Radwan Al - I., is eind mei van dit jaar in de Syrische plaats Shaam opgepakt en zit nu vast in de Fereh Palestine gevangenis in de hoofdstad Damascus. De arrestatie, door troepen van de Syrische veiligheidsdienst, vond plaats juist op het moment dat de 46-jarige Al-I. in het huwelijk zou treden met een meisje uit Shaam. Dat blijkt uit een aantal gesprekken die deze krant deze week heeft gevoerd met familieleden van Al-I. in Syrië. Het Syrische ministerie van Informatie weigerde gisteren de informatie van de familie te bevestigen.

"Radwan is gearresteerd toen hij het huis van zijn bruid wilde binnengaan", aldus Al-I.'s 35-jarige zus Iman, die als onderwijzeres op een basisschool in de Syrische stad Hama werkt. Ook drie anderen, Radwans broer, een zwager en diens achttienjarige zoon werden tijdens deze gelegenheid opgepakt, maar na twee uur weer vrijgelaten.

De Nederlandse autoriteiten zeggen niet op de hoogte te zijn van de arrestatie van Al-I. Volgens een woordvoerder van het landelijk parket, de instantie die in Nederland belast is met de vervolging van terrorismeverdachten, is Al-I. nog voortvluchtig. "Als hij in Syrië gepakt zou zijn, dan zouden wij dat hoogstwaarschijnlijk wel weten."

Een woordvoerder van het Nederlandse ministerie van Justitie wil niet zeggen of zijn arrestatie in Syrië bij het ministerie bekend is. Er bestaat geen uitleveringsverdrag tussen Nederland en Syrië, dat bovendien geen onderdanen uitlevert. Justitie heeft wel een internationaal opsporingsbevel tegen Al-I. uitgevaardigd.

De leider van de Hofstadgroep vluchtte uit Nederland op de dag van de moord op Theo van Gogh, op 2 november 2004. Onder zijn invloed zouden Mohammed B., de moordenaar van Van Gogh, en andere kopstukken van het Hofstadnetwerk zijn geradicaliseerd.

(Bron: GPD/De Gelderlander, 14 juli 2005, www.gelderlander.nl)

'Leider Hofstadgroep zit in Syrië'
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De geestelijk leider van de Hofstadgroep, de Syriër Redouan al-I. (43), verblijft mogelijk in zijn vaderland Syrië.
De Syriër is voortvluchtig sinds de moord op Theo van Gogh. Het openbaar ministerie ziet in hem de mentor van de leden van de Hofstadgroep.
Onlangs bleek dat terreurverdachte Samir A. in de gevangenis een brief heeft ontvangen van een vermeend lid van de Hofstadgroep, waarin hij de groeten krijgt van Abu Khaled, de bijnaam van de Syriër. ,,Hij belde vanuit Syrië om je de groeten te doen'', staat in de brief aan Samir A.
De nationale recherche wil niet zeggen of bekend is waar Al-I. verblijft. ,,Het enige wat ik kan zeggen is dat Nederland een internationaal opsporingsbevel voor hem heeft uitgevaardigd'', aldus woordvoerder W. de Bruin van justitie.
Al-I. kwam veelvuldig over de vloer bij Mohammed B., de moordenaar van Theo van Gogh. Als hij zou worden getraceerd in Syrië, is volgens justitie de kans 'nihil' dat hij wordt uitgeleverd. Nederland heeft geen uitleveringsverdrag met dat land.
(Bron: Algemeen Dagblad, 1 maart 2005, www.ad.nl)

(Zie ook log 'The Slaying of the Dutch Filmmaker (2)' waarin het Noorse instituut FFI de voortvluchtige alsvolgt noemt: Mohamed Bassem al-Issa, alias Radwan al-Issa, alias Abu Khaled. De namen Redouan al Issa en Redouan al Issar komen ook in de buitenlandse media voor. Zie ook log 'De Syrische connectie')

http://dutchreport.blogspot.com/2005/02/slaying-of-dutch-filmmaker.html
Thursday, February 17, 2005
The Slaying of the Dutch Filmmaker
The Norwegian Defence Research Establishment FFI has published on 2 February 2005 a highly interesting report: 'The Slaying of the Dutch Filmmaker' with Security classification: unclassified.

In the introduction, it is stressed that the Norwegian report "surveys in depth the available open source information about the ritualistic murder of the filmmaker Theo Van Gogh on the streets of Amsterdam on November 2, 2004". It does include, however, some information not from 'open sources', but provided by an unidentified 'Dutch intelligence official' in January 2005. Some of those remarks:
-It has (.....) been confirmed that three members of the network trained in Kashmiri jihad camps in Pakistan, and that two members attended a training facility in Afghanistan.
-Mohammed Bouyeri probably had a more important role in the group than was first perceived. The fact that the group regularly convened in his house is an indicator that he played an important role. In addition, his profile matches those of leading operatives and coordinators of planned attacks throughout Western Europe. There are indications that Bouyeri was the "communications coordinator" of the Hofstad Network.
-His current whereabouts is unknown, but according to a Dutch intelligence official there are indications that he might have headed back to Syria. (re. the Syrian preacher Ridwan al-Issar, the alleged ideological leader of the group.)


The members of the Hofstad Network:

Samir Azzouz Mohammed Bouyeri aka Abu Zubair Ahmed Hamdi Mohammed Fahmi Boughabe aka Abu Mussab Zine L. Ismail Akhnikh aka Suheib Jason Walters aka Abu Mujahied al-Amrikie Mohamed Bassem al-Issa aka Radwan al-Issa aka Abu Khaled Yousef E. Mohammed El Morabit Nouredine El Fatmi Mohammed El Bouklaoui Rachid Bousana Zakaria T. Nadir A. Jermain Walters


Conclusion

Conclusions from an unclassified Norvegian report on the Van Gogh killing:
The analysis (.....) indicates that the slaying of Theo Van Gogh should be considered a terrorist attack, not by a lone fanatic, but by a member of an al-Qaida inspired Sunni Islamist ad-hoc terrorist network. ...(bezoek zelf die link maar, is nogal langdradig en erg algemeen)

Read full report here.
http://rapporter.ffi.no/rapporter/2005/00376.pdf

Source: Norwegian Defence Research Establishment FFI, 'The Slaying of the Dutch Filmmaker'.
http://www.ffi.mil.no/start/article.jhtml?articleID=94516

Stukjes uit het rapport:

"...
In Amsterdam he was recruited by a group of Islamist militants. The group later convened regularly, twice a week, in the house Bouyeri rented at Marianne Philipsstraat 27 in the district of Geuzenveld-Slotermeer in Amsterdam, and held their religious sermons under the guidance of an elusive Syrian radical preacher going by the name of Ridwan al-Issar aka Abu Khatib. A number of Abu Khatib’s followers had been under surveillance by the Dutch secret service AIVD for more than two years, and the milieu had been code-named the Hofstad Network. “Hofstad” is another name for the city of Hague, where a few of the militants lived, although the centre of the group’s activities was in Amsterdam. The police, at one point during 2003, had questioned Bouyeri, but he had not been considered an important player at that time, and was subsequently released.24 The mysterious Syrian preacher vanished from Holland, reportedly on the very day of the slaying of Van Gogh. His current whereabouts is unknown, but according to a Dutch intelligence official there are indications that he might have headed back to Syria.25 The other members of the group have been detained and questioned after the attack.
...
The Syrian preacher Ridwan al-Issar was the ideological leader of the group. He applied for asylum in Germany in 1995, but the application was eventually rejected. In Germany he did not appear to be religious. According to Dutch newspapers he went to discotheques, drank beer and watched porn movies. In 1996 he was arrested at a railway station in the town of Aachen in possession of small amounts of heroin and hashish. He arrived in the Netherlands in 1998, and filed an application for asylum there also. While the application was pending he stayed at two different asylum seekers’ centres in the east of Holland. He appears to have undergone a process of soul-searching. He turned to Islam, and studied jihadist literature on the Internet. After a while he seems to have felt competent enough to give lectures about the Quran in several Dutch mosques. In one of the mosques, the radical al-Tawheed mosque in Amsterdam, he met Bouyeri and the other members of the Hofstad network and became their leader. When his application for asylum to Holland finally was rejected he went underground, but continued to guide the group. It appears al-Issar travelled back and forth between Germany and the Netherlands using fake documents. He was arrested once in Frankfurt in January 2003, but disappeared and showed up in Holland again. In November 2003 he was transferred to Germany by Dutch police, but managed to find his way back, and it is alleged that he was in Holland on the day of the Van Gogh murder.34 According to Radio Holland, al-Issar had stolen the identity of a member of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood who has been imprisoned in Syria.35 The fact that al-Issar held a leading position in the group, and that he, according to the Dutch Interior Minister, radiated “charisma” and exercised “great influence on youth from this network”, strongly indicates he had experience from one of the most important theatres of jihad before the invasion of Iraq, Afghanistan or Chechnya. The study “Jihad in Europe” showed how most leaders and core activists of terrorist cells that have been detected in Europe had an “Afghanistan record”.36
Mohammed Bouyeri probably had a more important role in the group than was first perceived. The fact that the group regularly convened in his house is an indicator that he played an important role.37 In addition, his profile matches those of leading operatives and coordinators of planned attacks throughout Western Europe. There are indications that Bouyeri was the “communications coordinator” of the Hofstad Network. He was very active on the Internet, and hosted a MSN group called Muwahhidin http://groups.msn.com/MuwahhidinDeWareMoslims.38 Using his alias Abu Zubair, he wrote articles about Islam and translated texts of influential radical Islamist thinkers, such as Abu Ala Mawdudi and Sayyid Qutb. Investigations of the Internet lives of Bouyeri and other members of the Hofstad Network revealed the existence of a radical and Iraq-focused discourse on seemingly harmless chat-rooms for young North African immigrants to Holland. 39
Despite his young age, the 18-year-old Dutch-Moroccan Samir Azzouz appears to have held a central position in the group. He was arrested together with two accomplices in November 2003, in possession of chemicals suited for bomb making. Despite this, he, and the others, were released due to lack of evidence. Azzouz was rearrested in June 2004, and at this point he was in possession of “more complete bomb-making ingredients”, as well as maps and floor plans of Borssele nuclear power station, Schiphol Airport, the Dutch Parliament, the Dutch Ministry of Defence and other public buildings in The Hague.40 According to The New York Times, Samir Azzouz wanted to go to Chechnya in order to participate in jihad against the Russians.41 In 2002, he was stopped in Ukraine on his way to Russia, and had to return to Holland.
Bouyeri befriended Samir Azzouz when he came to Amsterdam from Slotervaart, and the two have been observed together in five different apartments in Western Amsterdam that were frequented by members of the group.42
Another key member of the group was Ahmed Hamdi. He was probably the militants’ “treasurer”, playing a similar role to Said Bahaji of the 9/11 Hamburg cell. He administered the finances of the Hofstad network (such as paying rent for apartments and fees for communication devices, as well as wiring money to operatives who travelled abroad).
The militants also managed to place a “mole” inside the AIVD. Outhman Ben Ali (34) worked as a translator for the secret service, and he was leaking transcripts of telephone taps to the Hofstad Network, as well as to the radical Islamist Hassan O. Outhman belonging to a group of militants situated in the city of Utrecht.43
The group’s members who travelled to Pakistan and Afghanistan for training were identified as Jason Walters (19), Ismail Akhnikh and the Zakaria T (21). According to The Associated Press, Ismail Akhnikh received bomb-making training in Afghanistan.44 Jason Walters also managed to cross the Afghan border and join a training facility on his second journey, and flew back to Holland from Jalalabad.45 He is the son of an African American and a Dutch woman, and converted to Islam when he was 16. The young convert was harassed and exposed to racism in school. He was radicalised, joined the Hofstad Network, and went to Pakistan and Afghanistan for training. He and his younger brother Jermaine were expelled from the Amsterdam El Fath mosque for voicing radical views. The two brothers imposed strict religious rules in the home of their divorced mother, who decided to move out of the house with her daughter. Shortly afterwards, the brothers moved from Amsterdam to The Hague. 46
It seems Holland-based Islamist radicals have been relatively active in the European networks. A group headed by the French-Algerian militant Jamal Beghal planned to launch attacks against US targets in Europe. These plans were partly conceived in Holland. A Holland-based group dubbed the “Trabelsi-network” provided fake documents and took part in other support activities for Beghal and his cadre who also planned an attack against the canteen of the US airbase Kleine Brogel in Belgium, near the Dutch border. There have been no reports in open sources that the group of Bouyeri had any direct links to the “Trabelsi-network”. However, one Spain-based militant allegedly had connections in both milieus.47
Our studies of Islamist terrorist conspiracies in Western Europe suggest the existence of a substantial support-network for jihadist groups in the Netherlands and in Belgium.48 Apart from the Trabelsi-network there were other incidents that indicated a jihadist “infrastructure” in Holland. For example, in June 2003, Dutch police launched an investigation into a milieu of suspected Islamist militants clustered around a scuba diving school run by the Iraqi-born Kasim Ali. The incident invoked fears that Islamist militants were planning maritime terrorist attacks in Europe.49
Dutch authorities appear to have been increasingly aware of the threat of Islamist terrorism since 2001. The Van Gogh case shows that the services had taken steps to monitor suspected militants. According to the New York Times, a spokesman for the Dutch intelligence service said that “almost 40 people had been arrested over the last several years on suspicion of planning acts of terrorism or recruiting militants.50 The Associated Press quoted officials in the Dutch secret service saying “several dozen” Islamist militants or “muhjahidin” constitute a “hard core of about 150 radicals who are active in the Netherlands”.51 A spokesman for the Dutch secret service described the radical structures as diffuse “they are not members of groups, but rather individuals with a common ideology”, “people who think alike”.52 According to a report by the Dutch intelligence cited in the press, al-Qaida was “stealthily taking root in Dutch society” by recruiting alienated second-generation Muslim immigrants to Holland in mosques, cafes and prisons.53 The activities and contacts of the Holland-based Hofstad network were indeed parallel to those seen in terrorist conspiracies attributed to al-Qaida associated radical Islamist groups in other European countries after 2000.
The Hofstad Network was involved in activities outside the Netherlands, and established multiple international jihadist connections. The group allegedly maintained contacts with Islamist militants in Morocco, Belgium, Spain, Switzerland and Saudi Arabia. The terrorist suspects who were arrested in October 2003 allegedly exchanged “coded communications” with a Moroccan Islamist militant, imprisoned in Spain, who has been identified as Violaadim Akoudad aka Naoufel. In Naoufel’s calendar police found encoded telephone numbers of members of the Hofstad Network.54 Naoufel allegedly is a member of a Moroccan Salafist-Jihadist group established by so-called “Afghan Arabs” who returned to Morocco. This group has been dubbed the Moroccan Islamic Fighting Group (GICM or al-Jama`ah al-Islamiyya al-Muqatila bi’l- Maghrib), and it is suspected that members of this group formed the terrorist network that launched the Madrid bombings (M-11). Moroccan authorities want Naoufel because they believe he was involved in the terrorist operation in Casablanca on May 16, 2003.55 Another radical Salafist group formed by jihad veterans with experience from Afghanistan – al-Salafiyya al-Jihadiyya - allegedly staged the Casablanca attacks. However, in an interview in September 2004 a Spanish intelligence official, informed about the investigations of the terrorist attacks in Madrid on 11 March 2004, expressed doubts concerning the utility of differentiating between the various Moroccan Salafist-Jihadist groups, because they seem to share the same ideology and support al-Qaida’s doctrine of global jihad.56
According to Le Monde, Naoufel maintained ties to prominent jihadist-leaders and people belonging to the “al-Qaida hardcore”.57 Allegedly, he also was frequently in contact with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who is seen as the leader of the Islamic resistance in Iraq. Al-Zarqawi is known to have coordinated the activities of at least one active terrorist cell in Western Europe, and he is suspected of coordinating a broader network of Islamist terrorists operating in multiple European countries, but mainly in Italy, France, the UK and Germany.58
Reportedly, investigators have also been probing a possible relationship between members of the Hofstad Network, and a group of Moroccan militants that has been referred to as “Martyrs for Morocco”, arrested in Madrid in October 2004 and suspected of planning suicide bomb attacks against the Spanish National High Court, and possibly also Santiago Bernabeu soccer stadium (home field of Real Madrid).59 The terrorist cell reportedly “made necessary arrangements” for acquiring 1000 kgs of the plastic explosive Goma 2 Eco, the explosive that was used in the Madrid bombings. 500 kgs was planned to be used in a suicide attack against the High Court.60 The militants probably planned the attack as a response to increased Spanish counter-terrorism efforts after M-11, and wanted to kill the head of the Spanish terrorism investigations, Judge Baltazar Garson.61 The suspected leader of Martyrs for Morocco is an Algerian militant currently imprisoned in Switzerland, Muhammad Achraf (31). Achraf was regularly in contact with militants in Spain and members of the Hofstad Network in Holland. For example, he made several phone calls to Muhammad Bouyeri. According to The New York Times he also wired money to members of the Hofstad Network.62 One of the detainees held in Spain in connection with the High Court – plot, Abdol Ghaffar Hashemi, held a Dutch passport, whereas another, Mourad Yala, a friend of Samir Azzouz, was arrested in Holland in 2003, suspected of falsifying travel documents. Spanish investigators believe these two militants had been trying to convert laptops into bombs that could be used in terrorist attacks in the Netherlands.63
The Hofstad Network was also involved in planning attacks outside the Netherlands. On 11 June, 2004, Portuguese police arrested a group of Islamist militants in Porto. It is suspected that they planned to assassinate the Portuguese president-designate of the European Commission, Jose Manuel Durao Barroso, as well as other foreign guests, at a reception at the Freixo Palace on the night before the opening match of the Euro 2004 championship soccer tournament. Portuguese intelligence received a warning from their Dutch colleagues that three Dutch-Moroccan members of the Hofstad Network had travelled to Portugal. One of the terrorist suspects had shared an apartment with Van Gogh’s killer, and they drove from the Netherlands to Portugal in a VW Golf registered in the name of Bouyeri.64
Another of the Holland-based militants has been identified as Nouredine el Fatmi. Dutch police searched the apartment of el Fatmi and found a “last will”, saying that he wanted to die for jihad.65 According to the director of Judiciary Police, Adelino Salvado, the militants acted in a way that “pointed to the idea that something was being planned”.66 For example, they regularly collected small amounts of cash from Lisbon International Airport. Salvado made the decision to warn the potential targets about the threat, and had the suspected terrorists arrested and expelled from Portugal. Other police forces insisted that one should allow the plot to develop further in order establish a solid case against the suspects.67 Judging by Bouyeri’s and the Hofstad Network’s international contacts it seems safe to conclude that they were part of the numerous terrorist plots that have been unravelled over the past years in Western Europe. Islamist terrorist cells in Europe have planned to attack a wide spectre of targets, and commonly and routinely operated beyond state boundaries.
...
According to the Los Angeles Times, investigators said the letter “reflected the influence of the militant Takfir wal Hijra movement”.71 So-called takfiris allegedly played important roles in several of the Islamist terrorist cases in Europe after 2000. Al-Takfir wa’l Hijra, originally known as Jama`a al-Muslimun (The Society of Muslims) was a militant group established by Shukri Mustafa in Egypt in the 1970s. It was the Egyptian press that dubbed the movement al-Takfir wa’l Hijra, because of its ideology, stemming from a literal interpretation of Sayyid Qutb’s famous book “Milestones”. Takfir is the Arabic verbal noun for deeming someone an infidel (excommunication). Hijra is the Arabic word for flight or emigration, and is used about the Prophet Muhammad’s flight to Medina in 622, were the first Muslim community was established. The Society of Muslims excommunicated the society surrounding the group, fled, and established military camps or bases in the Egyptian mountains. In the mountain bases they prepared themselves to topple the regime and re-instate the Rule of God, Islamic law, al-Sharia in Egypt. In 1977 the militants felt strong enough to attack the regime, and murdered an Egyptian minister. Subsequently the group was crushed, and its leaders hanged. During the 1990s, it appears that the ideology of the group has resurfaced in militant Islamist milieus in North Africa, the Middle East and in Europe.
The magistrate Jean-Louis Bruguiere who heads the investigations into terrorist networks in France, believes al-Takfir wa’l Hijra is more of an ideology or way of thought than a clearly defined group or organization.72 The letter to Hirshi Ali did focus on her apostasy, but this alone does not necessarily mean that Bouyeri belonged to al-Takfir wa’l Hijra. Salafist groups emphasize takfir to varying degrees, and there have been conflicts between different groups concerning the legitimacy of excommunicating Muslims, and viewing Muslims as legitimate targets of the jihad. This is one of multiple conflict-dimensions in the relationships between Islamist groups. Deeming Hirshi Ali as an infidel would probably be an uncontroversial decision among most Islamist radicals given the fact that she herself publicly proclaimed that she was an “ex-Muslim”, and once called the Prophet Muhammad a paedophile because he married a 12-year-old girl.73 The point is that the target selection could indicate mainly religious motivation, an attack by extreme fundamentalists (takfiris), against public figures seen as infidels. However, in this report’s interpretation, the letter to Hirshi Ali focused more on politics than on religious belief. The broader message appears to be mainly political, “global jihadish”, and less religious, takfiri.
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11h22 - 14-Jul-2005