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Editorial See other Editorial Articles Title: Terror Suspect Says CIA Recruited Him Terror Suspect Says CIA Recruited Him By MIKE ROBINSON Associated Press Writer Published October 19, 2006 at 8:13 PM CDT U.S. Video CHICAGO (AP) -- A former university professor charged with plotting to bankroll Hamas terrorists was once asked by the CIA whether he wanted a job as a spy, his attorney told a jury Thursday. Abdelhaleem Ashqar, 48, apparently never pursued the idea. But his defense attorneys say the offer shows federal agents were eager to recruit him to spy on fellow Palestinians before doing an about-face and indicting him. Attorney William Moffitt showed jurors a June 17, 1996, letter on CIA stationary telling Ashqar, then a post-graduate business student at the University of Mississippi, that he might want a clandestine services job. "Operations officers serve overseas as collectors of information," the letter said. It told him to "tick the box below" to pursue such a job. But Moffitt said that when the job was suggested, federal agents already had searched his house, found the documents and tapped his phone. Ashqar, of Alexandria, Va., and suburban Chicago grocer Muhammad Salah, 53, are charged in a four-count racketeering indictment with furnishing thousands of dollars and fresh recruits to the Palestinian militant organization Hamas, which has been officially designated a terrorist group by the federal government. The indictment was announced in August 2004 in Washington by John Ashcroft, attorney general at the time, who called the men prime movers in "a U.S.-based terrorism recruiting and financing cell." The trial is expected to take three months, and expected witnesses include Israeli security agents. Also charged in the indictment but absent and classified as a fugitive is Mousa Abu Marzook, described by federal officials as the deputy chief of the political section of Hamas - which since winning an election last January has controlled the government of the Palestinian territories. Buy AP Photo Reprints Ashqar is accused of funneling money destined for Hamas fighters in Israel in the Palestinian territories through his U.S. bank accounts and making his home an archive of Hamas documents. Moffitt and Salah's attorney, Michael E. Deutsch, portrayed the two defendants as men who funneled money not to terrorists but to the poor and the downtrodden of the West Bank and Gaza Strip suffering under Israeli occupation. © 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Learn more about our Privacy Policy. Purchase this AP story for reprint.
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#1. To: tom007 (#0)
Wasn't there a story about a week ago about a similar situation, only it involved the UK intel services, and when they couldn't enlist a Muslim businessman to be a spy, they subsequently found evidence (ahem)that he was a tuurrerist and then they turned him over to the US to put him in Gitmo - I think the case came up in the article about 25% Gitmo prisoners not being guilty of anything and the US trying to palm them off back to their home countries.
That's pretty much what I remember reading about. Since our GI's know as much of the Arabic language as you and I do...it;s hard for this whole thing to be any thing but the utter disaster that it is. And the Generals are believing Rummy talks to God. Great....just Great.
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