BREAKING: Largest U.S. Islamic Charity Raided by FBI

[American Patriot]

September 18, 2006


BREAKING: Largest U.S. Islamic Charity Raided by FBI



By Debbie Schlussel

I've been writing about LIFE for Relief and Development for years, and I think my columns (especially this one), have finally made a difference. Ditto for my complaints about LIFE to Assistant U.S. Attorney for counterterrorism, Ken Chadwell.

Less than half an hour ago, the FBI began raiding LIFE and hauling out documents. Well, it's about time. LIFE--the largest Islamic charity still open for business in America--openly admitted on its 1995-'97 taxes to be a major funder of HAMAS. Headquartered in the Orthodox Jewish suburban Detroit subdivision in which I grew up, it gave millions to Human Appeal International, which the FBI identified as HAMAS' Jordanian operation. It has done many vague "Katrina," "Lebanon Relief," and "Afghanistan Wheelchair" fundraisers and believed to have laundered the money to terrorists.

Then, there are its multiple fundraisers over the last couple of years "for more Fallujahs" according to sources at a secret 2004 Los Angeles area fundraiser held by LIFE. LIFE is believed to be a major funder of the insurgent terrorists in Iraq. That's why, in 2004, the U.S. Army raided its Iraqi headquarters, frequently operated by its spokesman and operative Mohammed Alomari (more on him below).



The disturbing thing is that for years, the feds--including Homeland Security civil rights officer Daniel Sutherland, U.S. Attorney Stephen Murphy III, and his predecessor Jeffrey Collins--have feted this charity, all while it was apparently funding Islamic terrorists.





U.S. Attorney Stephen Murphy with Terrorist Charity Officials Khalil Jassem (left), Ihsan Al-Khatib (far right) & "Former" Terrorist Imad Hamad (Murphy's left)


Then-US Attorney Jeffrey Collins (center) w/LIFE Officials Muthanna Al-Hanooti, Imad Hamad, unidentified person, and Mohammed Alomari

My columns on LIFE certainly made a difference with its top officers. Mohammed Alomari--LIFE's spokesman and the author of an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory book and an article complaining that there are Jews in the Bush Administration--has been harassing me ever since I started writing about him and LIFE, including this page on his website. He also has repeatedly tried to alter the already inaccurate entry on me on Wikipedia.

LIFE's in-house general counsel, Ihsan Alkhatib, wrote a column in the Arab American News calling me a "verbal terrorist," whatever that means.


Alkhatib is also the President and general counsel for the Midwest Regional ADC (American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee), headed by former PFLP terrorist Imad Hamad--who also has close ties to LIFE. Senator Carl Levin, Alomari, and LIFE credited Hamad with getting LIFE USAID tax-funded status to administer our tax money in Iraq.



In 2002, LIFE led the Saddam Hussein propaganda trip that U.S. Democratic Congressmen David Bonior, Jim McDermott, and Mike Thompson, which was also funded by Iraqi oil-for-food scam artist Shakir Alkhafaji--who is living, free, in the Detroit suburb of West Bloomfield, despite $70 in earnings he obtained from doing business with Saddam.



From my 2003 column on LIFE, Imad Hamad lost a scheduled FBI award from Director Robert Mueller, because he was under investigation for terrorism:

One of those investigations apparently involves Hamad's close ties to Muthanna Al-Hanooti, Mohammed Alomari, and their charities, LIFE for Relief and Development and FAAIR (Focus on Arab American Issues and Reform). Hidden in an Orthodox Jewish neighborhood in Southfield, Michigan, LIFE is believed to fund Hamas via contributions to Hamas front groups identified in 2001 by FBI Assistant Director for Counterterrorism and Counterintelligence, Dale Watson.


One such front, Human Appeal International, believed by the FBI to be Hamas' Jordanian operation, was listed in LIFE tax returns as one of three supported organizations receiving millions in contributions. Human Appeal and another organization LIFE works with, Human Relief Foundation, are listed as participants in the "101 days campaign" website of Sheikh Youssef Al-Qaradawi, spiritual leader of terrorist group Muslim Brotherhood. The site is believed to raise money for homicide bombings Al-Qaradawi supports.



Alomari's book, "The Secrecy of Evil", and other writings allege Jewish control of the world and the Bush administration. His Daru Salam mosque radio website claimed Jews and the U.S. "organized" the 9/11 attacks. A 1996 LIFE fundraiser, arranged by Hanooti, featured speaker Sheik Abdulmunem Abu Zant, an ardent Hamas supporter, who said, "May G-d attack the Jews and those who stand with them. May G-d attack the Americans and those who stand with them." Hanooti appeared with indicted Islamic Jihad frontman Sami Al-Arian at a recent American Muslim Council lobbying seminar. LIFE's original registered agent (under its previous name, International Relief Association), Masood Aijazi, worked for Khalid bin Mahfouz, the financier of Mawafaq Foundation, designated a terrorist charity by the U.S. government.



Hamad's relationship with these parties is long-term and tight. A 1999 press release by Hamad's American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee credits Hamad with getting Senator Carl Levin, then-Senator Spencer Abraham, and David Bonior to grant LIFE a license to send millions to Iraq. "We have a special relationship with ADC here in Detroit." Hanooti said. "This is another example of the value of cooperation between our organizations . . . to advance our common agenda." In May 2003, Hamad visited terrorist-sponsor Syria and Lebanon with Hanooti and Alomari. Given all of this, a recent FAAIR newsletter photo of Collins (below) smilingly posing between Al-Hanooti, Hamad, and Alomari, at a FAAIR event, is disturbing. It is bad enough that a U.S. Attorney would associate with known anti- Semites. Worse, if Collins' office ever indicts them, it could be embarrassing.

Apparently, I'm not such a verbal terrorist at all, because the FBI finally took my investigative work on LIFE seriously. Again, they're raiding the charity as I write.



We'll see what they do with it after that. Given the incompetence of U.S. Attorney Stephen Murphy III--who has let other Islamic terror raidees flee the country before he indicts them--I'm not holding my breath.

[American Patriot]

FBI searches home of Muslim family: Missouri
The Columbia, Missouri Daily Tribune ^ | Monday, September 18, 2006 | JACOB LUECKE



FBI agents today searched the home of a Columbia businessman and former Iraqi who has been an outspoken critic of the war in Iraq.



Gerik Parmele photo

Officer Bill Lee of the Columbia Police Department
assists the FBI this morning during a search at 2701 Woodberry Court.
About a dozen FBI vehicles parked this morning in front of the home of Shakir Hamoodi, 54, at 2701 Woodberry Court, in the upscale The Pines neighborhood in southwest Columbia, neighbors said.


At exactly 9 a.m., the FBI agents left their cars and rushed the house. Two teenagers inside the house were brought outside and escorted to the family car and drove off, said a neighbor who did not want to be identified. The neighbor said the agents entered the house and removed boxes and other items. Some agents stood on the lawn and examined papers pulled from the house.


Hamoodi owns World Harvest International and Gourmet Foods on Nifong Boulevard. County records show he owns the Woodberry Court home with Lamya Najem, 40, who a neighbor said teaches at the Islamic School of Columbia Missouri.


Hamoodi Jeff Lanza, a spokesman for the FBI in Kansas City, would not say what prompted the raid, but he said the home was not a threat to the community.


Neither Hamoodi nor Najem could be reached for comment this morning. A neighbor who requested anonymity said police told him Hamoodi was out of the state this morning.


Several neighbors who watched the ongoing raid and requested anonymity said they didn’t know much about the family. "They have been nothing but very, very nice," one neighbor said.


Around 9:30 a.m. a Columbia police officer was rummaging through the home’s open garage while neighbors loitered outside and gawked. Shortly after a reporter arrived, the officer closed the garage door.


Officer Bill Lee turned away an attempt to question the FBI agents and asked a Tribune reporter and photographer to leave the property. He declined to answer questions.


Hamoodi is an Iraq native who lived in Scotland and France before moving to Columbia in 1985. He studied at the University of Missouri-Columbia and later became an engineering research assistant professor at the school. He left the school and opened World Harvest in 2004, according to a 2005 Tribune story about his business.


Hamoodi has been identified as an outreach coordinator for the Islamic Center.


"He’s been involved with charity. He’s a good human being and does a lot of charitable work," said Ahmed Habib, who knows Hamoodi and his family through the mosque. "He’s well respected in the community."
Neighbors said the home was generally quiet, although once every few months several cars would park there for about an hour. They speculated Hamoodi hosted religious gatherings.


Hamoodi has made several public appearances in opposition to the U.S. war in Iraq. At one event, a July 2005 speech at a Rotary Club event in Jefferson City, he was identified as a nuclear engineer living in Columbia.
In 2003 he participated in an MU forum on the war and said: "The U.S. Army is as unwanted as Saddam Hussein. The U.S. Army is probably more unwanted than Saddam Hussein."


After Saddam’s capture, Hamoodi told the Tribune the event was insignificant. "They found him in a hole, he can’t lead the resistance from a hole," Hamoodi was quoted as saying. "The war was a lie. Innocent people were killed. Is this worth finding weapons of mass destruction?"
Their home on Woodberry Court was recently defaced with spray-painted anarchist graffiti, neighbors said.


The Tribune’s Annie Nelson, Janese Heavin and Kevin Coleman contributed to this report.

[Aplomb]

Add this to the raids. Just a feeling...a not so good feeling about what's coming up soon...
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/a...EWS99/60918019

Federal agents raid Muslim charity in Southfield


September 18, 2006

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By Niraj Warikoo
Free Press Staff Writer




Federal agents remove office files and cabinets from an office at 17300 W. Ten Mile Road on Monday. (RICHARD LEE/Detroit Free Press)

Federal counterterrorism agents raided a Muslim charity in Southfield on Monday morning, according to the FBI.

Agents with the FBI and Joint Terrorism Task Force executed search warrants at the headquarters for Life for Relief and Development, a Southfield-based charity that works in Arab and Muslim countries around the world.

The warrants were based on a criminal predicate, said William Kowalski, assistant special agent in charge for the Detroit office of the FBI. The affidavits in support of the warrants are sealed, he said.

At about 9 a.m., agents raided the Southfield office, hauling away documents, letters and ledgers, said Dawud Walid, head of the Michigan branch of the Council on American Islamic Relations. Agents told officials with the charity that the raid was related to some sort of criminal activity, Walid said.

The charity has worked in Iraq, Pakistan and the Palestinian territories, among other countries.
According to its Web site, the charity has provided over $50 million in humanitarian assistance to more than 13 million beneficiaries worldwide.

It was founded in 1992 to help people in Iraq.