Terror Criminal Links Growing

By Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld and Alyssa A. Lappen
FrontPageMagazine.com | Thursday, September 13, 2007

Al Qaeda’s sophisticated new media campaign clearly demonstrates that the group does not lack funding. Contrary to popular belief, organizing, maintaining, training, and operating terrorist groups require large and liquid sums. Most terrorist organizations circumvent funding prohibitions by creating “political” and “charitable” wings, a ruse that enables their individual and state supporters to contribute “clean” money to the terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Hezbollah. Interviewed by ABC News on September 11, 2007, U.S. Treasury Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence (TFI) Stuart Levey, said: “If I could somehow snap my fingers and cut off the funding from one country, it would be Saudi Arabia.”

Still, the U.S. government does not designate the Saudis, or other oil producing countries as terrorist entities, although they are the major suppliers of “clean” money that feed of the global proliferation of radical Islam. As the West consumes more oil, the higher the price tends to rise and more petrodollars are available to spread radical Islam.

But “charitable” donations alone do not satisfy the terrorists growing appetite. They also regularly generate funds through “common” transnational crimes. Yet inadequate official recognition of this convergence lets terrorists operate below the radar.

A major funding source for terrorist and criminals is the trade in illegal drugs. In contrast to oil revenues, pricing illegal drug works precisely the opposite. The more heroin, cocaine and methamphetamines are produced, the larger global supply and consumption grow. Increasing supply force prices to drop precipitously, thereby creating even larger markets. In 1981, a gram of heroin cost $1,974 on U.S. streets; in 2003, a gram of heroin cost only $362, according to a National Drug Control Strategy document. [1] By September 2006, a gram of heroin cost only $75 to $95, according to two 2007 criminal indictments, filed by two northeastern Federal Districts. [2]

In late August 2007, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNDOC) reported that opium cultivation in Afghanistan had reached a new record. The area under opium cultivation grew 17%, to 193,000 hectares, compared with 165,000 hectares in 2006. Meanwhile, the opium yield grew by more than one third, to 8,200 tons, from 6,100 tons.

The UDOC attributes this amazing increase to the Taliban’s reversal of their 2000 edict banning cultivation, said Executive Director Antonio Maria Costa.[3] And Afghanistan now supplies some 95% of the world’s opiate/heroin market, according to Radio Free Europe.[4]

The nexus between transnational criminal organizations and terrorist groups does not end illegal drug trafficking. Their partnerships are complex, linking money, geography, politics, arms, and tactics to create a mutually beneficial relationship. These links yield hundreds of billions, of dollars in revenues worldwide.

On July 14, 2007, Deputy Chief of the Los Angeles Police Counterterrorism Criminal Intelligence Bureau, Michael Downing stated that laundered funds now “account for about 10 percent of the total global flow of money–up from about 2 percent in 1998.” In May 2001,[5] the FBI estimated that “the amount of money laundered each year is approximately $2.8 trillion.”

The former International Monetary Fund (IMF) managing director, Michel Camdessus, estimated that money laundered worldwide 1999, totaled between 2% and 5% of combined gross domestic product (GDP)—or approximately $1.8 trillion. By April 2006, the IMF’s World Economic Outlook estimate of the world economy was $65.174 trillion. Considering the rise of radical Muslim terrorist groups, and the dramatic increase in “ordinary” crime, as well as major technological advances, it is now estimated that at least $5 trillions are being laundered annually, 70% are thought to be generated from the illegal drug trade.

Even if only a little goes to terrorist groups, “it’s frightening,” Downing said. “Not only that, but you see the convergence of organized crime and terrorism occurring.”

In May 2007, Los Angeles Sheriff Department Lt., John Sullivan, stated: “organized crime groups in Los Angeles County are supporting international terrorists.” But this is not only Los Angeles’ problem.

According to a recent Gallup study, “counterfeiting and piracy costs Americans $250 billion in sales and 750,000 U.S. jobs annually.” [6] These involve counterfeiting of “CDs, DVDs, handbags, medications, cigarettes and even toothpaste.” [7]

Defrauding the U.S. Government of hundreds of billions of dollars and undermining local economies is just what Osama bin laden ordered on Dec. 27, 2001: “It is very important to concentrate on hitting the U.S. economy through all possible means…. Look for the key pillars of the U.S. economy. Strike the key pillars of the enemy again and again, and they will fall as one.”

Incredibly, despite substantial evidence that al Qaeda and other Islamic terrorist organizations need vast sums to sustain their operational infrastructures and broaden their bases, 9/11 Commission Vice-Chair Lee Hamilton and Commissioner Slade Gorton stated, “Making it harder for terrorists to get money is a necessary, but not sufficient, component of our overall strategy” (emphasis added). The willful blindness behind this attitude may partially explain inadequate power and implementation of existing laws and legal instruments to more efficiently combat terror financing and criminal activities.

Jihad is not committed by the sword alone. While less transparent, economic and financial jihads are far more insidious aspects of the jihadist war to defeat the West, and especially the U.S.

With this in mind, it would seem prudent for law enforcement to take a closer look at the identities and profiles of each and every “ordinary” criminal seized, be it a drug dealers, car thieves, or “white collar” criminals.

Notes:
[1] Table 45, “Avg. Price and Purity of Heroin in the U.S., 1981-2003,” http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/publications/policy/ndcs06_data_supl/ds_drg_rltd_tbls.pdf
[2] www.usdoj.gov/usao/pae/News/Pr/2007/may/monegro.pdf and www.usdoj.gov/usao/md/Public-Affairs/press_releases/press07/ThreeBaltimoreDrugDealersSentencedtoLengthyPrisonTerms.html viewed on Aug. 28, 2007
[3] Masood Haider, “UN Reports record production of opium in Afghanistan,” Dawn, Aug. 28, 2007, http://www.dawn.com/2007/08/28/top16.htm, viewed Aug. 28, 2007.
[4] Breffni O’Rourke, “Central Asia/Iran: Massive Afghan Opium Production Hits Neighbors,” Radio Free Europe/Liberty Radio, Aug. 28, 2007, http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2007/08/f58f6951-ad74-4996-bbb3-50fa2dcd7112.html, viewed Aug. 28, 2007.
[5] “Criminal Justice Resources: Money Laundering,” Michigan State University Libraries – Criminal Justice Resources, www.lib.msu.edu/harris23/crimjust/moneylau.htm, Source: “Money Laundering”, FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin v.70 no.5 (May 2001): p.1-9
[6] “Congress needs to get tough on China trade,” The Oakland Press, August 17, 2007 http://www.theoaklandpress.com/stories/081707/opi_20070817134.shtml
[7] Troy Anderson, “Drug sales, counterfeiting funding terrorism. Sheriff’s office says it’s intercepted plots, traced money back to extremist groups,” L.A. Daily News, August 20, 2007

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Uprooting jihad

Letters to the Editor
Washington Times | 11 July 2007

In his letter “The roots of terror” (Monday), Chuck Woolery claims that we misrepresented the “root” causes for Muslim suffering. Yet, “[t]he repression, suffering and death of hundreds of millions of Muslims” does not result from Western or Israeli policies or actions, but from totalitarian, corrupt Arab and Muslim regimes and clerics who confine them to the Dark Ages.

The current Sunni and Shi’ite fight in Iraq exhumes earlier wars, predating the American presence. Palestinians have received more financial aid than any other refugee group in history. They suffer because their corrupt leaders squandered it all, and prolonged the Palestinians’ misery. Bolstered by the Saudi/Gulf and Iranian regimes, the Palestinians advanced a culture of death and destruction, strangling the development of a viable society.

Jihad is an eternal Muslim institution, antedating modern Israel’s creation by 13 centuries. Through this institutional religious mechanism of war and repression, pre-Islamic Jews and Christians of historical Palestine were conquered, massacred, pillaged, enslaved and deported. The survivors and their descendants suffered the brutal Shariah-inspired system of dhimmitude until the League of Nations Mandate in 1918. That the Jewish people are now flourishing in democratic Israel, rather than as dhimmis under oppressive Islam, is still a basic “grievance” to Arabs and Muslims.

Appeasement and “critical and constructive dialogue” with jihadists whose goal is to restore the caliphate by any means, only proves ignorance of the Muslim Brotherhood agenda.

To stop the jihadists and alleviate the suffering of oppressed Muslims worldwide, we should discourage discussions with Islamists. Let the Islamists denounce their incessant attempts to politically enforce a seventh-century religious ideology upon entire nations. Let them also prove their denunciations by dismantling their terror funding networks.

When all jihadists renounce terrorism, al Qaeda stops killing “infidels,” Palestinians no longer indoctrinate children to become suicide bombers, Iran no longer seeks to eliminate the United States and Israel and Muslim nations institute basic human freedoms, only then can Mr. Woolery’s and our hopes for a peaceful world be realized.

Rachel Ehrenfeld and Alyssa A. Lappen
American Center for Democracy

Egyptian roots of hatred

By Rachel Ehrenfeld and Alyssa A. Lappen
Washington Times | Jul. 6, 2007

Had the citizens of Greeley, Colo., been friendlier to the introverted Egyptian student Sayyid Qutb during his studies there from 1948 to 1950, he might not have become the Muslim Brotherhood’s signature ideologue. But the lonesome Qutb resented everything America had to offer, especially individual freedom, capitalism, jazz and women’s “open” sexuality.

Shortly after returning to Egypt, Qutb joined the Muslim Brothers (or Muslim Brotherhood) and committed to paper the dogma of the organization’s founder, Hassan al-Banna, calling on all Muslims to resist modernization and live only according to the Islamic law, a theme Qutb expanded to include the “liberation” of Palestine, in subsequent writings of his own. The seeds of hatred for everything Western, which Qutb sowed half a century ago, have spread around the globe and are now growing like kudzu throughout America and the West.

Using the motto “God is our purpose, the Prophet our leader, the Qur’an our constitution, jihad our way and dying for God our supreme objective,” and armed with al-Banna’s master plan to expand Islamic fundamentalism, the Muslim Brothers began their jihad against the West.

Petrodollars turned the once small Egyptian radical organization into a global jihadist movement, spawning every Islamic terrorist group operating today. These include al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah and many other often nameless affiliated groups responsible for terrorist attacks like the latest at Glasgow’s airport and London’s foiled car bombings. Nevertheless the U.S. Department of State is well on its way to legitimizing the organization by accepting the Muslim Brotherhood’s self portrayal as “moderates” and “reformists.” Indeed, this is how some U.S. officials described the MB representatives with whom they engage in Egypt, Syria, Jordan and Iraq. Continue reading “Egyptian roots of hatred” →

The Muslim Brotherhood’s Duping of America

By Rachel Ehrenfeld and Alyssa A. Lappen
American Thinker | April 20, 2007

Making the Muslim Brotherhood a major player in Middle East politics seems to be one of the few subjects on which both Democrats and Republicans seem to agree. Neither the State Department nor the White House commented after U.S. House Majority Leader Stanley Hoyer met in Egypt with the Muslim Brotherhood’s parliamentarian leader, Mohammed Saad el-Katatni. Hoyer and el-Katani discussed recent developments in the Middle East, and the “Brotherhood’s vision.”

This meeting took place just one day after the conclusion of the Muslim Brotherhood 5th Cairo Conference: The International Campaign Against US & Zionist Occupation, in which delegations from Hizbollah and Hamas took part. The participants cheered as Muslim Brotherhood General Guide Muhammad Mahdi ‘Akef declared, “the devil Bush and his allies were now the ones sowing terror and aggression worldwide.”

Akef’s rant, translated from Arabic by MEMRI, blamed Bush for

“sending American youth to die by the thousands …at the expense of the poor in the U.S. and across the world.” His statement sounds similar to the claim of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid that “The president’s policies have failed, and…[he] endangers our troops and hurts our national security.”

Continue reading “The Muslim Brotherhood’s Duping of America” →

Show Me the Money and I’ll Show You the Agenda

By Andrew Cochran
Terrorfinanceblog | April 10, 2007

I’m trying to determine why senior U.S. government officials or Congressmen continue to entrust their precious time to those with an extremist or Islamist agenda when they’re searching for “moderate Muslims” with whom to hold a dialogue. It still happens all too often, even years after the 9-11 attacks (I have another example about which to post soon). And I have to conclude that too many government officials around the world and experts are still trusting what they hear from a foreign leader or long-standing Islamist, instead of watching what they actually do. My golden rule, probably due to my experience as a CPA and consultant, is simple: see how the Islamists and their supporters (or their opponents, for that matter) spend their money, and stop trusting what they say.

Analyses of the Muslim Brotherhood illustrate this point perfectly. Douglas Farah took issue with the Foreign Affairs article by the Nixon Center’s Robert Leiken and Steven Brooke, “The Moderate Muslim Brotherhood,” starting a mini-debate here and on the Nixon Center site (see Doug’s last post on it). But look at the angle each party takes in their analysis: Leiken and Brooke barely mention how MB leaders spend their money; it’s all about “expressions of confidence that it would honor democratic processes.” Yes, there is some discussion of “a painstaking educational program,” but nothing about the directions for the “big money.” To the contrary, Doug’s method is to follow the money. Everything he writes on MB, from his recent piece on Sudan to his 2006 analysis of the MB’s international financial network, focuses on the cash flow. Lorenzo Vidino explores the financial angle in his April 6 post, “The Muslim Brotherhood in Holland,” discussing how the MB has worked in Europe since World War II. Other articles in the debate break down along this fault line – see Alyssa Lappen’s response to Nick Fielding, in which she cited MB’s financial support for terrorism, while Fielding discounted or ignored such instances.

I recently mentioned to a senior Congressional staffer that “if you show me the money, I’ll show you 80% of the agenda.” He corrected me – “it’s 90%.” And he’s certainly right in the CT world, in the U.S. and abroad. Find out where a group gets it money and where it spends it, and you’ll know the group’s agenda.

The Muslim Brotherhood’s Propaganda Offensive

By Rachel Ehrenfeld and Alyssa A. Lappen
American Thinker | April 2, 2007

The Muslim Brotherhood (MB) is heightening its U.S. propaganda offensive in advance of the 2008 presidential elections, taking advantage of the political uncertainty and opposition to the current Administration’s defense policies against radical Muslim terrorist organizations and states.

Incredibly, “Hear Out the Muslim Brotherhood,” an op-ed in the Boston Globe on Sunday March 25, portrayed the outlawed Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood as a reforming tool to promote democracy and stability there and throughout the Middle East, and praised the MB for “surviving” decades of oppression by previous Egyptian regimes.

However, a referendum on March 26, 2007 in Egypt banned “the creation of political parties based on religion.” The MB, the biggest opposition group boycotted the vote and later criticized the results because of low voter turnout.

The MB, which is illegal in Egypt, Libya and Syria, operates in at least 70 countries. It is busy preparing the ground to establish Islamic global dominance, successfully using Western democracy to legally inject itself into the political process, while using the free media to portray the Brothers as reformers and protesting any attempt to limit their subversive activities. Indeed, even the Wall Street Journal agrees that in Egypt the MB “has become something of a default opposition.” Criticizing Egypt’s President Hosni Mubarak for the latest crackdown on the MB, the Journal declared, “Not even a modern-day Pharaoh can forbid people from gathering in mosques.” Continue reading “The Muslim Brotherhood’s Propaganda Offensive” →