Published on Alternet (http://www.alternet.org)
Home > FBI Is Manufacturing Terror Plots Against Jewish-Americans, Driving
Divisions Between Jews and Muslims
________________________________________
FBI Is Manufacturing Terror Plots Against Jewish-Americans, Driving
Divisions Between Jews and Muslims
By Aviva Stahl [1] / AlterNet [2]
May 10, 2016
AddThis Sharing Buttons
Share to FacebookShare to TwitterShare to Google+More AddThis Share
optionsShare to Email
Since 9/11, the FBI and NYPD have solved dozens of terror plots that its own
agents and assets manufactured, including some against synagogues. Even if
the plots were less than real, the foiled "attacks" have greatly impacted
both the defendants and their alleged victims, spreading fear among
Jewish-Americans and triggering panicked reports about heightened threat
against Jews.
The arrest [3] this April of James Medina, a recent convert to Islam with an
extensive criminal history, is the latest evidence of the disturbing
practice. An FBI affidavit showed an FBI source suggesting that Medina bomb
the Aventura Turnberry Jewish Center in Hollywood, Florida on a Jewish
holiday.
The source even encouraged Medina to claim the attack in the name of ISIS-a
group he had no affiliation to. "Yeah, we can print up... something and make
it look like it's ISIS here in America," Medina said, one of a series of
statements evincing an erratic mental state.
"Aventura, watch your back," he continued. "ISIS is in the house."
The FBI ultimately gave Medina a fake bomb and arrested him. He is now on
trial for planning to commit an act of terror with a weapon of mass
destruction, a charge that could land the 40-year-old in prison for life.
Medina's case is part of a clear pattern. Before his arrest, there were
other Muslim men, many of them converts, and most of them mentally troubled,
who were drawn into FBI dragnets and encouraged by federal law enforcement
agents to attack Jewish institutions.
Among the most shocking cases was that of Ahmed Ferhani, a young, clinically
bipolar Muslim teen currently serving a 10-year sentence in prison for
terrorism-related charges.
Manipulation
"The synagogue bomber," that's what his lawyer, Lamis Deek, remembers the
press calling Ahmed Ferhani.
On May 13, 2011, Ferhani and his co-defendant, Mohamed Mamdouh, were
arrested and charged [4] with planning to dress up as Hasidic Jews and plant
a bomb in a Manhattan synagogue.
Many New York Jews were horrified. "It takes only 1 percent of the people we
don't catch for tragedy to strike our community... We are just so grateful
that the police caught it in time," Rabbi Eli Shifrin of the ultra-Orthodox
Chabad sect told the Bayside-Douglaston Patch [5] after Ferhani and Mamdou
were arrested.
But as with most domestic terrorism cases, especially those supposed plots
in which undercover cops or informants play a role, the truth was much more
complicated than it first seemed.
In an interview with AlterNet, Deek explained how it was the undercover NYPD
detective-and not the defendants-who introduced the idea of bombing the
synagogue, and manipulated the vulnerable, clinically bipolar Ferhani into
making anti-Semitic remarks.
This April, Ferhani tried to hang himself in his jail cell, a result of the
constant torment he endured from prison guards as a result of his alleged
crimes, according to Deek. Her client is currently in a medically induced
coma and may not survive-and if he does, he may suffer from permanent brain
damage.
As Ahmed Ferhani's family keeps vigil at his bedside, questions continue to
mount about the alleged plot that brought him there.
A Case of Entrapment?
The story of Ferhani's path to prison begins in 2010, when a friend
introduced him to a man who called himself name Ilter Ayturk.
Ayturk was really an undercover NYPD officer with a history of initiating
potentially illegal activities before his intended targets, so much so that
the Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF)-the multi-agency federal force charged
with preventing attacks-had previously declined to get involved in his
investigations.
Ayturk and Ferhani quickly grew close. "He was my twin, my best friend,"
Ferhani told the Nation [6] in 2013. Ferhani is bipolar, according to his
mother Kheira, and was hospitalized on and off as a teenager. Kheira would
sometimes have to call 911 when her son got out of control, so the NYPD was
well familiar with him, even before Ayturk was introduced into his life.
An October 2012 article published in the New York Review of Books [7]
analyzed Ferhani's case alongside several other plots "foiled" by the NYPD.
"Mentally unstable people may be capable of great harm and paid informants
may help detect serious crimes," noted writer Michael Greenberg.
"But the facts in these cases warrant critical attention."
According to press reports, the undercover detective, Ayturk, soon started
suggesting various schemes for Ferhani to make money and spoke to him about
what was happening in Palestine and across the globe.
Next, Ayturk began introducing the anti-Semitic angle. "Ilter would start
riling up Ferhani, and start trying to blame all these horrible things on
the Jews," explained Deek. "Then he would try to get Ahmed Ferhani to say
something along those same lines."
According to Deek, soliciting these kinds of comments from Ferhani was
crucial for the prosecution to work. Overtly political or anti-Jewish
statements would enable the government to "overcome the entrapment defense,
because now they've established predisposition," she explained.
Eventually, Ferhani met with an undercover agent posing as a weapons dealer,
and paid $100 in exchange for 150 rounds of ammunition, three semiautomatic
pistols and an inert hand grenade, supposedly to be attack a Manhattan
synagogue.
"Absolutely," said Deek, when I asked if Ayturk had also suggested the idea
of attacking the synagogue. "He introduced everything."
Deek's insistence that Ferhani's case amounted to entrapment-in the spirit
of the law, if not the letter-is echoed by some press coverage of the trial.
"The government says he is a terrorist," penned John Knefel is his March
2013 Nation [6] article. "But his conversations with undercover police tell
a different story."
Since the federal government had refused to take on the case, Ferhani and
his co-defendant were charged under a little-known state terrorism statute.
In June 2011, a grand jury declined to indict them on the most serious
charges put forward by the government, but indicted Ferhani and his
co-defendant on lesser offenses, including planning to blow up an empty
synagogue.
In December 2012, Ferhani pled guilty to nine terrorism-related charges and
one hate crime charge. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
It wasn't the first time an undercover operative in a counter-terrorism
sting would encourage the plot's anti-Jewish turn.
In 2007, FBI informant Shahed Hussain was sent to infiltrate the Masjid
al-Ikhlas mosque in Newburgh, New York, where he soon introduced himself to
a local resident, James Cromitie. Although Cromitie tried to ditch Hussain,
the informant was persistent, and with time Hussain started encouraging
Cromitie to adopt hateful views. Jews "are responsible for all the evils in
the world," Hussain told his target in one October 2008 conversation.
Later that same day, Hussain tried to compel Cromitie to action: "When I
feel these Moishites, these Yahud, in Palestine, killing Muslims, or killing
people in Iraq or in Afghanistan, one of our brothers, I always think about
going for a cause, for a cause of Islam."
"Have you thought about that brother?" he asked Cromitie.
At the behest of Hussain, Cromitie recruited three other men as lookouts by
offering them with substantial sums of money. The promises made by the
informant sometimes appeared to exploit the men's greatest vulnerabilities.
David Williams, for example, agreed to get involved after Hussain offered to
help him secure the cash to pay for his brother's liver transplant [8].
On May 20, 2009, the day of the planned attack, Cromitie and Hussain placed
three inert explosive devices in a Mazda and parked outside of the Riverdale
Jewish Center, while the other men acted as lookouts. The defendants have
since said they never planned to set the bombs off, but rather swindle
Hussain out of the cash.
The "bombs" had been built by the FBI and provided to the Newburgh Four
through Hussain, and the government had selected the target.
Soon, cops swooped in to arrest.
It's a case that's been sharply criticized. "There would have been no crime
here except the government instigated it, planned it, and brought it to
fruition," US District Judge Colleen McMahon told the court [9] when she
sentenced Cromitie and his co-defendants to the mandatory minimum of 25
years.
In a Guardian opinion piece [10] published in June 2011, then-director of
the Center on Law and Security at NYU's Law School, Karen Greenberg,
wondered whether Hussain's hateful actions and words were really in the
public interest: "Who really thinks that tax dollars are well spent to
support utterances of anti-Semitism as a means of bonding with potential
criminals and turning them into attempted terrorists?"
A History of Manufacturing Anti-Semitism
There are other questions, too-like whether it was the undercover
operatives, their handlers, or higher-ups in the NYPD or FBI, who guided the
plots towards their anti-Jewish end.
"I definitely suspect that there was a lot of detailed instructions in this
case," for Ayturk, said Deek when I asked her what she thought.
It's a startling image: a group of cops or FBI agents sit around an office
table and plot the details of an "attack" on Jews.
The idea sounds implausible, even conspiratorial. But the FBI has previously
made calculated decisions before to exploit anti-Semitism as a means of
managing perceived national security threats.
As Kenneth O'Reilly writes in his landmark text Racial Matters: The FBI's
Secret File on Black America, "one of the FBI's favourite tactics was to
accuse the Panthers and other black nationalists of anti-Semitism, a tactic
designed to destroy the movement's image 'among liberal and naive
elements.'"
In late 1969, the FBI devised a plan to establish contact with Rabbi Meir
Kahane, head of the Jewish Defense League (JDL), for "counter-intelligence
purposes." The ultra-nationalist JDL that had already held several highly
publicized protests against "Black anti-Semitism," and at the time, Kahane
was writing a column for the Jewish Press.
The FBI soon began sending Kahane anonymous messages intended to depict the
Black Panther Party (BPP) as violently anti-Semitic, material that Kahane
integrated into his column. One such letter to Kahane declared: 'We will get
you one by one. Israel will have to be destroyed. Too much Jewish Political
Power now. In the future it will be Black power."
Tensions grew so high that a street battle almost broke out between the BPP
and the JDL in May 1970. "The FBI. was pleased" with this development,
narrates Robert Friedman in his 1990 biography about Kahane's life. "Kahane
was the perfect stooge."
Widening Divisions Between Muslims and Jews
While the Black Panther Party may no longer be "the greatest threat to the
internal security of the country"-as FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover once
said-today those same worlds could quite easily be applied to Muslim
"extremists."
There is no evidence to suggest there is a coordinated scheme within the
NYPD or the FBI to drive divisions between Muslims and Jews-but for families
directly affected by the plots, it seems like the writing is on the wall.
Shahina Parveen is the mother of Matin Siraj, who is currently serving 30
years on terrorism-related charges, another instance in which the government
informant played a key role and induced his target into adopting
anti-Semitic beliefs. Parveen is also close friends with Ferhani's mother.
"Hate is like a wildfire," Parveen told AlterNet. "It is the police
informants and undercovers who start these fires through manipulating
impressionable young people to not only manufacture these cases, but also to
cause mistrust across our communities."
"Is this a part of their duties?" she lamented.
The informant in Siraj's case, Osama Eldawoody, acted as a religious guide
for her son, Parveen told me when I interviewed her several years ago. The
two men met in 2003, at the Islamic bookstore in Bay Ridge where Siraj
worked.
He was an impressionable young man who had struggled in school and was often
described as a little slow. Siraj quickly became attached to his older
friend.
"Eldawoody's play was that there's a war on Muslims, and that America and
Israel are at the heart of it," explained Siraj's attorney, Martin Stolar,
when I spoke to him over the phone. "And that the war on Muslims being
perpetrated in Iraq and Afghanistan and against the Palestinians, required a
true Muslim to take action."
When Eldawoody encouraged Siraj to plan an attack, Siraj suggested bombing
the 34th St. Herald Square subway station. Eldawoody offered to acquire
weapons, but the plan never got past its initial stages, and it is clear
from other recordings that Siraj had mixed feelings about moving forward.
At one point Siraj told Eldawoody that he wanted to ask his mother for
permission [11] before proceeding, and he later informed Eldawoody he wanted
out of the plan completely.
But the government didn't back off. Siraj and his co-defendant, James
Elshafay, were arrested in late August 2004, and the recordings of Siraj
making anti-Semitic statements were played at his trial and reported by the
press.
"Comments like that would affect the jury, and they definitely affected the
judge," said Stolar when I asked how the remarks played out.
"[The judge] was angered by those kinds of comments-her background is
Jewish," explained Stolar. Siraj was found guilty and sentenced to 30 years.
Laura Whitehorn is a Jewish left-wing activist who served time in prison for
her political activities during the era of COINTELPRO.
"In my experience, the claim that someone-especially an alleged
'terrorist'-was motivated by anti-Semitism seems calculated to silence any
questioning, any doubt," she told AlterNet. "It's a way to try to slam dunk
the target, ensuring that the public will not sympathize with them or
question the evidence against them."
Undercover operatives in the cases also appeared to elide the distinction
between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism, even if that meant editorializing
over material critical of the occupation.
"In none of the films or the literature that the undercover was sharing, or
using, with Ferhani or Mamdouh-in none of them was there an iota of
anti-Semitism, or a blaming of the Jews in any of the propaganda that he
used," explained Deek.
"However," added Deek, "when [Ilter] would refer to them, that's how he
would talk-and he would push Ferhani to say these things, to say
anti-Semitic things, especially as it relates to Palestine."
Ayturk had infiltrated Palestine activist groups in New York City as early
as 2008 [12], and was actually spying on the local chapter of Al-Adwa, the
Palestine right to return coalition, when he met the mutual friend who
subsequently introduced him to Ferhani.
Government Grants to Targets of FBI-Manufactured Plots
Oren Segal, the Director of the Anti-Defamation League's Center on
Extremism, said that he felt debates about entrapment were worthwhile, but
that no one should forget the impact of the alleged plots on Jews.
"Whether or not that case was handled as best as possible-let people debate
that, they should," said, referring to the Newburgh Four case. "We should
always hold our law enforcement accountable for what they're doing."
"But I will tell you, there's no debate that case had an impact on the
security and safety of the Jewish community, and how they felt about it.
When we're talking about the issue of anti-Semitism, and the role it played
there, at the end of the day people tried to plant some bombs in front of
Jewish institutions," he added.
Fearful people want protection, and protection is pricey-so in the years
since 9/11, American Jews have pushed for government funds.
The Nonprofit Security Grant Program (NSGP), which was created by Congress
in 2005, "provides funding [13] support for target hardening and other
physical security enhancements and activities to non-profit organizations
that are at high risk of a terrorist attack." As of FY 2014, Jewish
organizations and institutions have received the vast majority of the $151
million [14] awarded, including 74 percent of the funds distributed between
2007 and 2010, 81 percent in 2011, 97 percent in 2012 [15] and nearly 90
percent of the money given out in 2014 [16].
"This disproportionate distribution is no accident," wrote Eileen Reynolds
and two other Jewish Daily Forward journalists in an extensive investigation
[15] published in September 2011.
"The coalition lobbying for the program was led by United Jewish
Communities, now known as the Jewish Federations of North America, and by
the Orthodox Union and several other Jewish groups."
Some communities targeted by government-driven plots have benefitted
directly. After the alleged attacks, the Riverdale Temple and the Riverdale
Jewish Center each received a $25,000 grant [17] "to upgrade their security
systems."
But the arrests have also been utilized by Jewish groups across the city to
secure funding. In the NSGP application for the grant money, institutions
are required to demonstrate that they or closely related organizations have
been subject to threats or attacks by terrorist groups. The Jewish Community
Relations Council of New York produces a comprehensive document [18] to help
Jewish groups establish risk.
"The Riverdale and Manhattan [Ferhani] bomb plots are exhibits of the
continuing that of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and vehicle-borne
IEDs," notes the author in a section on how to establish high probability
and high consequence threats.
"This Case Killed Him"
Of course, some terrorist groups do propagate the notion that Muslims are at
war with America, and "the Jews."
"I tell Muslims to believe in the victory of God and in Jihad against the
infidels of the world," said Osama Bin Laden in an October 2002 interview
published by CNN [19]. "The killing of Jews and Americans is one of the
greatest duties."
Jews have also faced real danger. During the November 2015 attacks on Paris,
suspected gunmen Amedy Coulibaly stormed a kosher supermarket and killed
four people. Six people were murdered in the attack on Mumbai's Chabad House
in November 2008, including a woman who was five months pregnant.
In the cases examined here, however, the defendants would likely never have
been able to pull off an attack on their own, and they knew little or
nothing about Judaism. "After Ilter had suggested that, they're so angry,
they should go bomb a synagogue, or they should do something at synagogue,
Mamdouh actually looked at Ilter and said, 'what the hell is a synagogue,'"
Lamis Deek recalled.
Some American Jewish institutions see and cite these plots as proof of the
danger posed by Muslim "extremists," even though the primary person peddling
the "extremist" ideology was the government agent. A 2013 ADL report [20]
entitled, "American Muslim Extremists: A Continuing Threat to Jews," refers
to both the Ferhani and the Newburgh arrests on its first page.
Progressive Jewish organizations operating outside the institutional tent
have taken a different stance. "It is not uncommon for anti-Muslim sentiment
or policies to be connected to the Islamophobic stereotype that Muslims hate
Jews," said Naomi Dann, the Media Coordinator at Jewish Voice for Peace. "It
is particularly disturbing when this false stereotype is encouraged by
actions of the state or law enforcement, and when accusations of
antisemitism are used to justify Islamophobia."
"Cases of entrapment, and the infiltration and surveillance of community
groups that goes along with these practices, have very real and harmful
impacts on Muslim communities, and should outrage all of us," she stressed.
Being drawn into a government-manufactured plot has changed the lives of the
defendants and their families irrevocably. A son behind bars means one less
breadwinner in the home, and the often-exorbitant expense of visiting him
behind bars can be taxing. The parents and siblings of the defendants have
sometime endured surveillance from the police or FBI, even visits from
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
The day after her son was sentenced, Shahina Parveen, along with her husband
and daughter, were picked up by ICE [21] and placed in immigration
detention, due to outstanding issues in Parveen's husband's legal status.
All three were eventually released, but the experience was very difficult,
Parveen told me.
Then there is Ahmed Ferhani, who wrote about the abuses he faced at the
hands of prison guards in letters reviewed by the Nation [22]. "At least 90
percent of the abuse that he suffered at the hands of the COs was a direct
result of the charges that were brought against him, and that's what drove
him crazy," said Deek when I asked her about the impact of the alleged plot.
"This case killed him, or near killed him, and it devastated his family,"
she reflected, her voice trembling with sorrow.
Nefarious or not, the plots have driven a wedge between city residents of
the two faiths.
"Jews feel like the victims of [these plots]," the ADL's Segal told me when
I asked him about Muslim community concerns.
In 2011, I interviewed Alicia McWilliams, the aunt of one of the Newburgh
Four defendants. She recalled a visit to the rabbi at Riverdale Jewish
Center just one week after the arrests:
"I told him, 'The government manufactured this crime', and he said, 'Well,
James [Cromitie] said some hurtful things' [on the FBI tapes]... 'You will
not see us out there [supporting the accused]' and we didn't."
McWilliams continued, "Then I met with him this past July, and I asked him
how it would feel to be used. We were used, and you were used. The only
difference is that you're getting grants, and David and them are going away
for life."
Neither the NYPD nor the FBI have responded to requests for a response to
the allegations raised in this article.
For now, the Newburgh Four remains behind bars, Matin Siraj counts down the
days until his release, and Kheira Ferhani sits at her son's bedside,
praying for his recovery.
Aviva Stahl is a Brooklyn-based journalist who writes about prisons,
national security, and immigration detention.
Share on Facebook Share
Share on Twitter Tweet
Report typos and corrections to 'corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx'. [23]
[24]
________________________________________
Source URL:
http://www.alternet.org/grayzone-project/fbi-manufacturing-terror-plots-agai
nst-jewish-americans-driving-divisions-between
Links:
[1] http://www.alternet.org/authors/aviva-stahl
[2] http://alternet.org
[3]
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/topic/crime-law-justice/fbi-ORGOV000008-topic.ht
ml
[4]
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/nypd-arrests-2-queens-terror-suspects-
charged-plot-hit-nyc-synagogues-grenades-guns-article-1.146295
[5]
http://patch.com/new-york/bayside/area-jewish-community-reacts-to-alleged-te
rror-plot
[6] http://www.thenation.com/article/did-nypd-entrap-ahmed-ferhani/
[7] http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2012/10/25/problem-new-york-police/
[8]
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/were-the-newburgh-4-really-out-to-blow-up-s
ynagogues-a-defendant-finally-speaks-out-6430182
[9]
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/documents-provide-rar
e-insight-into-fbis-terrorism-stings/2012/04/13/gIQASJ6CGT_story.html
[10]
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/jun/30/fbi-terroris
m
[11]
http://www.democracynow.org/2007/1/10/police_entrapment_in_terror_case_nyc
[12] http://nypdconfidential.com/columns/2012/120319.html
[13]
http://www.fema.gov/media-library-data/1438022313637-aad6aaf5b678f6e5750fb04
7ebb1aa33/FY_2015_NSGP_Fact_Sheet_Allocations.pdf
[14] https://scnus.org/scn-updates/weekly-r/scn-contributor-2a
[15]
http://forward.com/news/142542/how-an-anti-terror-program-became-a-jewish-ea
rmark/
[16] http://advocacy.ou.org/orthodox-union-applauds-2014-security-funding/
[17]
http://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/general/35033/paterson-announces-securit
y-grants-for-riverdale-synagogues-targeted-in-foiled-terror-plot.html
[18]
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KWpACdKDNOROAw55wd4DMnogKJXKPnZczAy8I3eM
UJ4/edit?pref=2&pli=1#heading=h.5x0d5h95i329
[19]
http://edition.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/south/02/05/binladen.transcript/
[20]
http://www.adl.org/assets/pdf/combating-hate/muslim-extremists-threat-to-jew
s-2013-4-24-v1.pdf
[21]
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/10/AR2007011002
068.html
[22]
http://www.thenation.com/article/a-muslim-man-was-ensnared-in-a-terror-plot-
by-the-nypd-he-just-attempted-suicide/?nc=1
[23] mailto:corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx?Subject=Typo on FBI Is Manufacturing
Terror Plots Against Jewish-Americans, Driving Divisions Between Jews and
Muslims
[24] http://www.alternet.org/
[25] http://www.alternet.org/%2Bnew_src%2B
Published on Alternet (http://www.alternet.org)
Home > FBI Is Manufacturing Terror Plots Against Jewish-Americans, Driving
Divisions Between Jews and Muslims
FBI Is Manufacturing Terror Plots Against Jewish-Americans, Driving
Divisions Between Jews and Muslims
By Aviva Stahl [1] / AlterNet [2]
May 10, 2016
AddThis Sharing ButtonsShare to FacebookShare to TwitterShare to Google+More
AddThis Share optionsShare to Email
Since 9/11, the FBI and NYPD have solved dozens of terror plots that its own
agents and assets manufactured, including some against synagogues. Even if
the plots were less than real, the foiled "attacks" have greatly impacted
both the defendants and their alleged victims, spreading fear among
Jewish-Americans and triggering panicked reports about heightened threat
against Jews.
The arrest [3] this April of James Medina, a recent convert to Islam with an
extensive criminal history, is the latest evidence of the disturbing
practice. An FBI affidavit showed an FBI source suggesting that Medina bomb
the Aventura Turnberry Jewish Center in Hollywood, Florida on a Jewish
holiday.
The source even encouraged Medina to claim the attack in the name of ISIS-a
group he had no affiliation to. "Yeah, we can print up... something and make
it look like it's ISIS here in America," Medina said, one of a series of
statements evincing an erratic mental state.
"Aventura, watch your back," he continued. "ISIS is in the house."
The FBI ultimately gave Medina a fake bomb and arrested him. He is now on
trial for planning to commit an act of terror with a weapon of mass
destruction, a charge that could land the 40-year-old in prison for life.
Medina's case is part of a clear pattern. Before his arrest, there were
other Muslim men, many of them converts, and most of them mentally troubled,
who were drawn into FBI dragnets and encouraged by federal law enforcement
agents to attack Jewish institutions.
Among the most shocking cases was that of Ahmed Ferhani, a young, clinically
bipolar Muslim teen currently serving a 10-year sentence in prison for
terrorism-related charges.
Manipulation
"The synagogue bomber," that's what his lawyer, Lamis Deek, remembers the
press calling Ahmed Ferhani.
On May 13, 2011, Ferhani and his co-defendant, Mohamed Mamdouh, were
arrested and charged [4] with planning to dress up as Hasidic Jews and plant
a bomb in a Manhattan synagogue.
Many New York Jews were horrified. "It takes only 1 percent of the people we
don't catch for tragedy to strike our community... We are just so grateful
that the police caught it in time," Rabbi Eli Shifrin of the ultra-Orthodox
Chabad sect told the Bayside-Douglaston Patch [5] after Ferhani and Mamdou
were arrested.
But as with most domestic terrorism cases, especially those supposed plots
in which undercover cops or informants play a role, the truth was much more
complicated than it first seemed.
In an interview with AlterNet, Deek explained how it was the undercover NYPD
detective-and not the defendants-who introduced the idea of bombing the
synagogue, and manipulated the vulnerable, clinically bipolar Ferhani into
making anti-Semitic remarks.
This April, Ferhani tried to hang himself in his jail cell, a result of the
constant torment he endured from prison guards as a result of his alleged
crimes, according to Deek. Her client is currently in a medically induced
coma and may not survive-and if he does, he may suffer from permanent brain
damage.
As Ahmed Ferhani's family keeps vigil at his bedside, questions continue to
mount about the alleged plot that brought him there.
A Case of Entrapment?
The story of Ferhani's path to prison begins in 2010, when a friend
introduced him to a man who called himself name Ilter Ayturk.
Ayturk was really an undercover NYPD officer with a history of initiating
potentially illegal activities before his intended targets, so much so that
the Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF)-the multi-agency federal force charged
with preventing attacks-had previously declined to get involved in his
investigations.
Ayturk and Ferhani quickly grew close. "He was my twin, my best friend,"
Ferhani told the Nation [6] in 2013. Ferhani is bipolar, according to his
mother Kheira, and was hospitalized on and off as a teenager. Kheira would
sometimes have to call 911 when her son got out of control, so the NYPD was
well familiar with him, even before Ayturk was introduced into his life.
An October 2012 article published in the New York Review of Books [7]
analyzed Ferhani's case alongside several other plots "foiled" by the NYPD.
"Mentally unstable people may be capable of great harm and paid informants
may help detect serious crimes," noted writer Michael Greenberg.
"But the facts in these cases warrant critical attention."
According to press reports, the undercover detective, Ayturk, soon started
suggesting various schemes for Ferhani to make money and spoke to him about
what was happening in Palestine and across the globe.
Next, Ayturk began introducing the anti-Semitic angle. "Ilter would start
riling up Ferhani, and start trying to blame all these horrible things on
the Jews," explained Deek. "Then he would try to get Ahmed Ferhani to say
something along those same lines."
According to Deek, soliciting these kinds of comments from Ferhani was
crucial for the prosecution to work. Overtly political or anti-Jewish
statements would enable the government to "overcome the entrapment defense,
because now they've established predisposition," she explained.
Eventually, Ferhani met with an undercover agent posing as a weapons dealer,
and paid $100 in exchange for 150 rounds of ammunition, three semiautomatic
pistols and an inert hand grenade, supposedly to be attack a Manhattan
synagogue.
"Absolutely," said Deek, when I asked if Ayturk had also suggested the idea
of attacking the synagogue. "He introduced everything."
Deek's insistence that Ferhani's case amounted to entrapment-in the spirit
of the law, if not the letter-is echoed by some press coverage of the trial.
"The government says he is a terrorist," penned John Knefel is his March
2013 Nation [6] article. "But his conversations with undercover police tell
a different story."
Since the federal government had refused to take on the case, Ferhani and
his co-defendant were charged under a little-known state terrorism statute.
In June 2011, a grand jury declined to indict them on the most serious
charges put forward by the government, but indicted Ferhani and his
co-defendant on lesser offenses, including planning to blow up an empty
synagogue.
In December 2012, Ferhani pled guilty to nine terrorism-related charges and
one hate crime charge. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
It wasn't the first time an undercover operative in a counter-terrorism
sting would encourage the plot's anti-Jewish turn.
In 2007, FBI informant Shahed Hussain was sent to infiltrate the Masjid
al-Ikhlas mosque in Newburgh, New York, where he soon introduced himself to
a local resident, James Cromitie. Although Cromitie tried to ditch Hussain,
the informant was persistent, and with time Hussain started encouraging
Cromitie to adopt hateful views. Jews "are responsible for all the evils in
the world," Hussain told his target in one October 2008 conversation.
Later that same day, Hussain tried to compel Cromitie to action: "When I
feel these Moishites, these Yahud, in Palestine, killing Muslims, or killing
people in Iraq or in Afghanistan, one of our brothers, I always think about
going for a cause, for a cause of Islam."
"Have you thought about that brother?" he asked Cromitie.
At the behest of Hussain, Cromitie recruited three other men as lookouts by
offering them with substantial sums of money. The promises made by the
informant sometimes appeared to exploit the men's greatest vulnerabilities.
David Williams, for example, agreed to get involved after Hussain offered to
help him secure the cash to pay for his brother's liver transplant [8].
On May 20, 2009, the day of the planned attack, Cromitie and Hussain placed
three inert explosive devices in a Mazda and parked outside of the Riverdale
Jewish Center, while the other men acted as lookouts. The defendants have
since said they never planned to set the bombs off, but rather swindle
Hussain out of the cash.
The "bombs" had been built by the FBI and provided to the Newburgh Four
through Hussain, and the government had selected the target.
Soon, cops swooped in to arrest.
It's a case that's been sharply criticized. "There would have been no crime
here except the government instigated it, planned it, and brought it to
fruition," US District Judge Colleen McMahon told the court [9] when she
sentenced Cromitie and his co-defendants to the mandatory minimum of 25
years.
In a Guardian opinion piece [10] published in June 2011, then-director of
the Center on Law and Security at NYU's Law School, Karen Greenberg,
wondered whether Hussain's hateful actions and words were really in the
public interest: "Who really thinks that tax dollars are well spent to
support utterances of anti-Semitism as a means of bonding with potential
criminals and turning them into attempted terrorists?"
A History of Manufacturing Anti-Semitism
There are other questions, too-like whether it was the undercover
operatives, their handlers, or higher-ups in the NYPD or FBI, who guided the
plots towards their anti-Jewish end.
"I definitely suspect that there was a lot of detailed instructions in this
case," for Ayturk, said Deek when I asked her what she thought.
It's a startling image: a group of cops or FBI agents sit around an office
table and plot the details of an "attack" on Jews.
The idea sounds implausible, even conspiratorial. But the FBI has previously
made calculated decisions before to exploit anti-Semitism as a means of
managing perceived national security threats.
As Kenneth O'Reilly writes in his landmark text Racial Matters: The FBI's
Secret File on Black America, "one of the FBI's favourite tactics was to
accuse the Panthers and other black nationalists of anti-Semitism, a tactic
designed to destroy the movement's image 'among liberal and naive
elements.'"
In late 1969, the FBI devised a plan to establish contact with Rabbi Meir
Kahane, head of the Jewish Defense League (JDL), for "counter-intelligence
purposes." The ultra-nationalist JDL that had already held several highly
publicized protests against "Black anti-Semitism," and at the time, Kahane
was writing a column for the Jewish Press.
The FBI soon began sending Kahane anonymous messages intended to depict the
Black Panther Party (BPP) as violently anti-Semitic, material that Kahane
integrated into his column. One such letter to Kahane declared: 'We will get
you one by one. Israel will have to be destroyed. Too much Jewish Political
Power now. In the future it will be Black power."
Tensions grew so high that a street battle almost broke out between the BPP
and the JDL in May 1970. "The FBI. was pleased" with this development,
narrates Robert Friedman in his 1990 biography about Kahane's life. "Kahane
was the perfect stooge."
Widening Divisions Between Muslims and Jews
While the Black Panther Party may no longer be "the greatest threat to the
internal security of the country"-as FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover once
said-today those same worlds could quite easily be applied to Muslim
"extremists."
There is no evidence to suggest there is a coordinated scheme within the
NYPD or the FBI to drive divisions between Muslims and Jews-but for families
directly affected by the plots, it seems like the writing is on the wall.
Shahina Parveen is the mother of Matin Siraj, who is currently serving 30
years on terrorism-related charges, another instance in which the government
informant played a key role and induced his target into adopting
anti-Semitic beliefs. Parveen is also close friends with Ferhani's mother.
"Hate is like a wildfire," Parveen told AlterNet. "It is the police
informants and undercovers who start these fires through manipulating
impressionable young people to not only manufacture these cases, but also to
cause mistrust across our communities."
"Is this a part of their duties?" she lamented.
The informant in Siraj's case, Osama Eldawoody, acted as a religious guide
for her son, Parveen told me when I interviewed her several years ago. The
two men met in 2003, at the Islamic bookstore in Bay Ridge where Siraj
worked.
He was an impressionable young man who had struggled in school and was often
described as a little slow. Siraj quickly became attached to his older
friend.
"Eldawoody's play was that there's a war on Muslims, and that America and
Israel are at the heart of it," explained Siraj's attorney, Martin Stolar,
when I spoke to him over the phone. "And that the war on Muslims being
perpetrated in Iraq and Afghanistan and against the Palestinians, required a
true Muslim to take action."
When Eldawoody encouraged Siraj to plan an attack, Siraj suggested bombing
the 34th St. Herald Square subway station. Eldawoody offered to acquire
weapons, but the plan never got past its initial stages, and it is clear
from other recordings that Siraj had mixed feelings about moving forward.
At one point Siraj told Eldawoody that he wanted to ask his mother for
permission [11] before proceeding, and he later informed Eldawoody he wanted
out of the plan completely.
But the government didn't back off. Siraj and his co-defendant, James
Elshafay, were arrested in late August 2004, and the recordings of Siraj
making anti-Semitic statements were played at his trial and reported by the
press.
"Comments like that would affect the jury, and they definitely affected the
judge," said Stolar when I asked how the remarks played out.
"[The judge] was angered by those kinds of comments-her background is
Jewish," explained Stolar. Siraj was found guilty and sentenced to 30 years.
Laura Whitehorn is a Jewish left-wing activist who served time in prison for
her political activities during the era of COINTELPRO.
"In my experience, the claim that someone-especially an alleged
'terrorist'-was motivated by anti-Semitism seems calculated to silence any
questioning, any doubt," she told AlterNet. "It's a way to try to slam dunk
the target, ensuring that the public will not sympathize with them or
question the evidence against them."
Undercover operatives in the cases also appeared to elide the distinction
between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism, even if that meant editorializing
over material critical of the occupation.
"In none of the films or the literature that the undercover was sharing, or
using, with Ferhani or Mamdouh-in none of them was there an iota of
anti-Semitism, or a blaming of the Jews in any of the propaganda that he
used," explained Deek.
"However," added Deek, "when [Ilter] would refer to them, that's how he
would talk-and he would push Ferhani to say these things, to say
anti-Semitic things, especially as it relates to Palestine."
Ayturk had infiltrated Palestine activist groups in New York City as early
as 2008 [12], and was actually spying on the local chapter of Al-Adwa, the
Palestine right to return coalition, when he met the mutual friend who
subsequently introduced him to Ferhani.
Government Grants to Targets of FBI-Manufactured Plots
Oren Segal, the Director of the Anti-Defamation League's Center on
Extremism, said that he felt debates about entrapment were worthwhile, but
that no one should forget the impact of the alleged plots on Jews.
"Whether or not that case was handled as best as possible-let people debate
that, they should," said, referring to the Newburgh Four case. "We should
always hold our law enforcement accountable for what they're doing."
"But I will tell you, there's no debate that case had an impact on the
security and safety of the Jewish community, and how they felt about it.
When we're talking about the issue of anti-Semitism, and the role it played
there, at the end of the day people tried to plant some bombs in front of
Jewish institutions," he added.
Fearful people want protection, and protection is pricey-so in the years
since 9/11, American Jews have pushed for government funds.
The Nonprofit Security Grant Program (NSGP), which was created by Congress
in 2005, "provides funding [13] support for target hardening and other
physical security enhancements and activities to non-profit organizations
that are at high risk of a terrorist attack." As of FY 2014, Jewish
organizations and institutions have received the vast majority of the $151
million [14] awarded, including 74 percent of the funds distributed between
2007 and 2010, 81 percent in 2011, 97 percent in 2012 [15] and nearly 90
percent of the money given out in 2014 [16].
"This disproportionate distribution is no accident," wrote Eileen Reynolds
and two other Jewish Daily Forward journalists in an extensive investigation
[15] published in September 2011.
"The coalition lobbying for the program was led by United Jewish
Communities, now known as the Jewish Federations of North America, and by
the Orthodox Union and several other Jewish groups."
Some communities targeted by government-driven plots have benefitted
directly. After the alleged attacks, the Riverdale Temple and the Riverdale
Jewish Center each received a $25,000 grant [17] "to upgrade their security
systems."
But the arrests have also been utilized by Jewish groups across the city to
secure funding. In the NSGP application for the grant money, institutions
are required to demonstrate that they or closely related organizations have
been subject to threats or attacks by terrorist groups. The Jewish Community
Relations Council of New York produces a comprehensive document [18] to help
Jewish groups establish risk.
"The Riverdale and Manhattan [Ferhani] bomb plots are exhibits of the
continuing that of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and vehicle-borne
IEDs," notes the author in a section on how to establish high probability
and high consequence threats.
"This Case Killed Him"
Of course, some terrorist groups do propagate the notion that Muslims are at
war with America, and "the Jews."
"I tell Muslims to believe in the victory of God and in Jihad against the
infidels of the world," said Osama Bin Laden in an October 2002 interview
published by CNN [19]. "The killing of Jews and Americans is one of the
greatest duties."
Jews have also faced real danger. During the November 2015 attacks on Paris,
suspected gunmen Amedy Coulibaly stormed a kosher supermarket and killed
four people. Six people were murdered in the attack on Mumbai's Chabad House
in November 2008, including a woman who was five months pregnant.
In the cases examined here, however, the defendants would likely never have
been able to pull off an attack on their own, and they knew little or
nothing about Judaism. "After Ilter had suggested that, they're so angry,
they should go bomb a synagogue, or they should do something at synagogue,
Mamdouh actually looked at Ilter and said, 'what the hell is a synagogue,'"
Lamis Deek recalled.
Some American Jewish institutions see and cite these plots as proof of the
danger posed by Muslim "extremists," even though the primary person peddling
the "extremist" ideology was the government agent. A 2013 ADL report [20]
entitled, "American Muslim Extremists: A Continuing Threat to Jews," refers
to both the Ferhani and the Newburgh arrests on its first page.
Progressive Jewish organizations operating outside the institutional tent
have taken a different stance. "It is not uncommon for anti-Muslim sentiment
or policies to be connected to the Islamophobic stereotype that Muslims hate
Jews," said Naomi Dann, the Media Coordinator at Jewish Voice for Peace. "It
is particularly disturbing when this false stereotype is encouraged by
actions of the state or law enforcement, and when accusations of
antisemitism are used to justify Islamophobia."
"Cases of entrapment, and the infiltration and surveillance of community
groups that goes along with these practices, have very real and harmful
impacts on Muslim communities, and should outrage all of us," she stressed.
Being drawn into a government-manufactured plot has changed the lives of the
defendants and their families irrevocably. A son behind bars means one less
breadwinner in the home, and the often-exorbitant expense of visiting him
behind bars can be taxing. The parents and siblings of the defendants have
sometime endured surveillance from the police or FBI, even visits from
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
The day after her son was sentenced, Shahina Parveen, along with her husband
and daughter, were picked up by ICE [21] and placed in immigration
detention, due to outstanding issues in Parveen's husband's legal status.
All three were eventually released, but the experience was very difficult,
Parveen told me.
Then there is Ahmed Ferhani, who wrote about the abuses he faced at the
hands of prison guards in letters reviewed by the Nation [22]. "At least 90
percent of the abuse that he suffered at the hands of the COs was a direct
result of the charges that were brought against him, and that's what drove
him crazy," said Deek when I asked her about the impact of the alleged plot.
"This case killed him, or near killed him, and it devastated his family,"
she reflected, her voice trembling with sorrow.
Nefarious or not, the plots have driven a wedge between city residents of
the two faiths.
"Jews feel like the victims of [these plots]," the ADL's Segal told me when
I asked him about Muslim community concerns.
In 2011, I interviewed Alicia McWilliams, the aunt of one of the Newburgh
Four defendants. She recalled a visit to the rabbi at Riverdale Jewish
Center just one week after the arrests:
"I told him, 'The government manufactured this crime', and he said, 'Well,
James [Cromitie] said some hurtful things' [on the FBI tapes]... 'You will
not see us out there [supporting the accused]' and we didn't."
McWilliams continued, "Then I met with him this past July, and I asked him
how it would feel to be used. We were used, and you were used. The only
difference is that you're getting grants, and David and them are going away
for life."
Neither the NYPD nor the FBI have responded to requests for a response to
the allegations raised in this article.
For now, the Newburgh Four remains behind bars, Matin Siraj counts down the
days until his release, and Kheira Ferhani sits at her son's bedside,
praying for his recovery.
Aviva Stahl is a Brooklyn-based journalist who writes about prisons,
national security, and immigration detention.
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.
Report typos and corrections to 'corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx'. [23]
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.[24]
Source URL:
http://www.alternet.org/grayzone-project/fbi-manufacturing-terror-plots-agai
nst-jewish-americans-driving-divisions-between
Links:
[1] http://www.alternet.org/authors/aviva-stahl
[2] http://alternet.org
[3]
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/topic/crime-law-justice/fbi-ORGOV000008-topic.ht
ml
[4]
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/nypd-arrests-2-queens-terror-suspects-
charged-plot-hit-nyc-synagogues-grenades-guns-article-1.146295
[5]
http://patch.com/new-york/bayside/area-jewish-community-reacts-to-alleged-te
rror-plot
[6] http://www.thenation.com/article/did-nypd-entrap-ahmed-ferhani/
[7] http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2012/10/25/problem-new-york-police/
[8]
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/were-the-newburgh-4-really-out-to-blow-up-s
ynagogues-a-defendant-finally-speaks-out-6430182
[9]
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/documents-provide-rar
e-insight-into-fbis-terrorism-stings/2012/04/13/gIQASJ6CGT_story.html
[10]
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/jun/30/fbi-terroris
m
[11]
http://www.democracynow.org/2007/1/10/police_entrapment_in_terror_case_nyc
[12] http://nypdconfidential.com/columns/2012/120319.html
[13]
http://www.fema.gov/media-library-data/1438022313637-aad6aaf5b678f6e5750fb04
7ebb1aa33/FY_2015_NSGP_Fact_Sheet_Allocations.pdf
[14] https://scnus.org/scn-updates/weekly-r/scn-contributor-2a
[15]
http://forward.com/news/142542/how-an-anti-terror-program-became-a-jewish-ea
rmark/
[16] http://advocacy.ou.org/orthodox-union-applauds-2014-security-funding/
[17]
http://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/general/35033/paterson-announces-securit
y-grants-for-riverdale-synagogues-targeted-in-foiled-terror-plot.html
[18]
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KWpACdKDNOROAw55wd4DMnogKJXKPnZczAy8I3eM
UJ4/edit?pref=2&pli=1#heading=h.5x0d5h95i329
[19]
http://edition.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/south/02/05/binladen.transcript/
[20]
http://www.adl.org/assets/pdf/combating-hate/muslim-extremists-threat-to-jew
s-2013-4-24-v1.pdf
[21]
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/10/AR2007011002
068.html
[22]
http://www.thenation.com/article/a-muslim-man-was-ensnared-in-a-terror-plot-
by-the-nypd-he-just-attempted-suicide/?nc=1
[23] mailto:corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx?Subject=Typo on FBI Is Manufacturing
Terror Plots Against Jewish-Americans, Driving Divisions Between Jews and
Muslims
[24] http://www.alternet.org/
[25] http://www.alternet.org/%2Bnew_src%2B
