Submitted by Paul Williams PhD on Wed, 12/23/2009 - 22:24
Paul Williams, PhD
TheWall Street Journal reports this week that U.S. investigators arediscovering that more and more young Muslims are vanishing frommosques, madrassas, and Islamic centers.
Thedisappearances, the Journal notes, are raising grave concerns among FBIand Homeland Security officials who fear that an onset of jihadistactivity will take place on American soil in the near future.
Hundreds of Muslim men are also missing from Islamberg and this is not a propitious omen.
Thesentry post is gone and no guards are in sight at the entrance to the70 acre Islamic settlement located in the dense forest between Depositand Hancock in upper New York State.
Young men inIslamic garb no longer congregate before the makeshift mosque, and nostudents are in attendance at the one room shack that serves as SheikhGilani's “International Quranic Open University.”
Gunfireno longer can be heard from the firing ranges along the easternparameter of the property – and no grunts come from new recruits at theobstacle course.
A new sign at the entranceway reads,“Welcome to Holy Islamberg: The International Quranic Open University.”Next to this sign, which features the image of a mosque emerging fromthe mountains, is a pot of plastic carnations. Another sign proclaimsthat the community is home to the “United Muslim – Christian Forum.”
Such statements of welcome are offset by the “No Trespassing” signs that have been nailed to trees throughout the compound.
Onthe opposite side of the road leading into the community is a rack ofmetal mailboxes bearing such names as Abdul-Haqq, Abdul Jalil, MumimRoberts, Abdullah Simonds, and Salam Insan.
What hashappened to this once bustling complex of radical Islamists – a placewhere the cries of muezzins were accompanied by the incessantrat-tat-tat of machine gunfire? Where are the Arab dignitaries thatused to visit this remote community in chauffeur- driven limousines?Where are the armed sentries who warded away all intruders?
Ahandful of children play in the mud and muck before rows of rusty oldtrailers, and a few women in full burkas walk along the rutty dirt roadthat leads to the heart of the squalid Muslim compound.
Thefew residents who remain in the settlement are not environmentalists.Sewage seeps from septic tanks and outhouses into the creek that flowsat the base of the settlement. Bags of rotting garbage remain stackedbetween the trailers. And the once pristine countryside is now litteredwith junk cars, moldy mattresses, empty tanks of propane, and oldappliances.
Where are the men?
What has happened to this bustling center of jihadi training?
Why has Islamberg become a ghost town?
Thesame phenomenon of vanishing Muslim men is taking place at mosques,madrassas, and other Islamic communities throughout the country and atother Jamaat ul-Fuqra paramilitary compounds, including one in RedHouse, Virginia.
U.S. investigators have now discoveredthat many of the missing Muslims are showing up in the killing fieldsof Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Somalia.
Five AmericanMuslims recently were arrested in Pakistan following a raid at the homeof a member of the Jaish-e-Muhammad, a Pakistani movement designated asa terrorist group by the U.S. Treasury Department in 2001.
Thefive American Muslims – identified as Ahmed Abdullah, Waqar HassanKhan, Eman Hassan, Yasir and Rami Zamzam – were planning to join forceswith the Taliban to fight the U.S.-led coalition forces in Afghanistan.
Zamzam is a graduate dental student at Howard University, where he served as president of the Muslim Student Association.
DavidColeman Headley, another Muslim who disappeared, is a native of Chicagowho attended Lashkar-e-Toiba-operated terrorism training camps inPakistan and helped Lashker-e-Toiba members and others plan and executethe attacks in Denmark against the newspaper which published cartoonsdepicting the Prophet Mohammed, which Muslims found offensive, as wellas the violent attack in Mumbai, in about 170 people died.
Atthe same time Headley was taken into custody, U.S. investigatorsdiscovered that 20 Somali immigrants, who were reported missing from amosque in Minnesota, had joined the Islamist insurgent group, alShabaab, and were engaged in fighting Somalia's U.S.-backed government.
Andthere is the case of Najibullah Zazi, a 24-year-old resident of Denver,who made a trip to Peshawar, Pakistan, in 2008 for the stated purposeof visiting his wife only to show up at an al Qaeda training camp wherehe received instruction in making and detonating explosives. InSeptember, Zazi was collared by federal officials as he made his way toNew York City to carry out attacks with the same back-pack bombs thatwere used to blow up a train station in Madrid and several subwaystations in London.
Where are the Muslim men from Islamberg?
Theanswer comes from a heavy-set woman in a long black burka who stops tocheck her mail box. “The men – all gone,” she says in halting English.“All – in Pakistan.”
Islamberg was established in 1980by Sheikh Mubarak Ali Gilani, a Pakistani cleric who served as the imamof the Yasin Masjid in Brooklyn. A quack practitioner of somethingcalled “Koranic psychiatry,” Sheikh Gilani presented himself to theBrooklyn congregation as "the sixth Sultan ul Faqr,” with a lineagethat dates back to the prophet Mohammed. He claimed to havesupernatural powers that came from his regular reception of visits byjinn and “non-human beings.”
Sporting ammunition belts,Gilani called upon members of a Black Muslim street gang known as Daral-Islam (DAR) to take part in the holy war against the Sovietoccupation of Afghanistan. Hundreds answered the call and headed off totraining camps in Pakistan, which had been established by Osama binLaden, and other members of the mujahadeen.
UnderGilani’s direction, the DAR transformed into Jamaat ul-Fuqra (“thecommunity of the impoverished”) and continued its prison ministry underMuslims of the Americas, a new, non-profit corporation. The sheikh sooncame to realize that it would be financially advantageous to train newrecruits for the holy war on American soil rather than shelling out thefreight of sending them to Lahore and Peshawar. He purchased a 70-acreparcel of land near Green Haven, set up a firing range and an obstaclecourse, purchased a slew of old single-wide trailers and created aparamilitary compound called Islamberg.
When releasedfrom the federal prison, former convicts now received not only thecustomary $10 and a suit of clothes but also a one-way ticket toGilani’s compound.
What took place at Islamberg and the International Quranic Open University?
Theanswers came from Sheikh Gilani in his recruitment videos: “We give[students] specialized training in guerilla warfare. We are at presentestablishing training camps. You can easily reach us at Open Quranicoffices in upstate New York or in Canada or in South Carolina or inPakistan.”
Similarly, in a handbook, published by theuniversity, Gilani wrote that the foremost duty of all students is towage war against “the oppressors of Muslims.” The students are expectedto sign an oath that reads: “I shall always hear and obey, and whenevergiven the command, I shall readily fight for Allah’s sake.”
Nowthat the recruits at Islamberg have been trained in the basics ofguerilla warfare, they have been deployed to Pakistan for advancedcourses in explosives and weapons of mass destruction.
They will be returning home soon.
Click here for more on this disturbing story.
FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor Paul L. Williams is the author of The Day of Islam: The Annihilation of America and the Western World, The Al Qaeda Connection,and other best-selling books. He is a frequent guest on such nationalnews networks as ABC News, CBS News, Fox News, MSNBC, and NPR. Visithis website at http://thelastcrusade.org.