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NO TERRORISM AGAINST
AMERICA
BUT CHARITY FOR
BOSNIAN and
CHECHEN
FREEDOM
FIGHTERS IS A "CRIME"
ENAAM ARNAOUT SENTENCED TO ELEVEN YEARS in PRISON
New Trend commentary: In one of the most
ridiculous decisions aimed at
destroying Muslim charities, a Judge in
Chicago
has sentenced a Muslim
charity organizer to ELEVEN YEARS in prison. The
prosecutors couldn't find Enaam
Arnaout guilty of any connection with terrorism
but they had to punish him for
helping Muslim women and children. So they found
that out of the money his
charity had collected, he had donated about 10%
to get shoes and uniforms for
Muslim freedom fighters in Chechnya and Bosnia.
Thus any work done to help Muslims who
fight is a crime in the U.S. The
most ridiculous aspect of this sentencing is that
THE DONORS WHO GAVE THE
FUNDS TO THE CHARITY DID NOT COMPLAIN. The
prosecutor went ahead and punished him
in any case. [According to the
Qur'an,
which is
the basis of Muslim charity,
funds can be given to help strugglers like those
in Bosnia and Chechnya.]
The U.S. has CLOSED DOWN HOLY LAND FOUNDATION,
the biggest
Palestinian
charity. It has closed down GLOBAL, the second
biggest Muslim charity, and DEPORTED
its Director. And now the third Muslim charity,
BENEVOLENCE, has been hit so
hard that its Director has been treated like a
common criminal and sentenced to
11 years.
There can be little doubt that these attacks
on Muslim charities are
meant to cripple Muslim efforts to help the
needy. By CONTRAST, AMERICAN JEWS are
funneling huge funds every year to the criminal
state of
Israel
Below is the way the sentencing of the
Muslim charity leader was
reported in the U.S.
[Note that Enaam had met Osama in the 1980s when
Osama was not fighting
America. That meeting is being used as a way of
painting Enaam as a "terrorist."]
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Muslim Charity Leader Sentenced to Prison
Monday August 18, 2003
CHICAGO (AP) - A Muslim charity leader linked by
prosecutors to Osama
bin Laden's terrorist network was sentenced
Monday to more than 11 years
in federal prison for defrauding donors.
Enaam Arnaout, 46, a
Syrian-born
U.S. citizen who
says he has met bin
Laden but opposes terrorism, was calm as the
sentence was imposed by
U.S. District Judge Suzanne B. Conlon.
The government's investigation of Arnaout and his
BenevolenceInternational
Foundation, based in suburban Palos Hills until
it was
shut down in 2002, has been a major component of
the war on terrorism.
Attorney General John Ashcroft traveled to
Chicago to announce the
charges against Arnaout when he was indicted.
Arnaout (pronounced ARE-not) pleaded guilty to a
racketeering charge,
admitting that he diverted thousands of dollars
from his
Benevolence International Foundation to support Islamic
military groups in Bosnia
and Chechnya.
Conlon sentenced Arnaout to 11 years and four
months in prison. He must
serve nearly 10 years before he is eligible for
parole.
She gave him a term longer than the eight to 10
years called for in
sentencing guidelines because, she said, the
$200,000 to $400,000 he
funneled to military groups deprived needy
refugees of important aid.
But the judge had earlier declined a prosecution
request to boost the
sentence to 20 years, on the basis of Arnaout's
ties to members of bin
Laden's al-Qaida network. She said the links
supplied grounds for
suspicion but didn't constitute evidence that he
backed terrorism.
She ordered Arnaout to pay $315,624 in
restitution and recommended that
it be turned over to the United Nations for
refugee work.
Arnaout, looking tired after more than a year in
solitary confinement,
spoke briefly before the court, saying he had
been kidnapped by the
government. He insisted he was innocent.
"I came to this country to enjoy freedom and
justice," Arnaout said.
"I came to have a peaceful life."
Arnaout claimed to have answered all the
questions put to him by
prosecutors in their investigation of al-Qaida.
His attorneys said he
met bin Laden in the 1980s when the terrorist
mastermind was part of the
U.S.-supported struggle of
Afghan
fighters to
expel the Soviet army. But
they say he has had nothing to do with bin Laden
in recent years.
Prosecutors say he lied about his associations
with bin Laden and his
supporters.
Among other things, they said one of bin Laden's
top aides, Mamdouh
Salim, traveled to Bosnia with papers showing
that Salim was a board
member of Benevolence International.
They also said that a man described by U.S.
Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald
as "a famous member of al Qaida" was hired by
Arnaout to serve as the
charity's top man in Chechnya.
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2003-08-20 Wed 17:47ct