SCN Case Study: Recent Threats against the Jewish Community REPORT 003—November 23, 2005 ****************************************************************** Contents: Terrorism Arrests, Trials, and Indictments over the Past 12 Months United States 1 United States Canada 3 October 13, 2004 Ivan Duane Braden, a former National Guardsman discharged from an Iraq- bound unit after superiors noted signs of instability, is arrested after checking United 4 into a mental health facility and telling counselors about plans to blow up a Kingdom synagogue and a National Guard armory in Tennessee. The FBI reports that Braden told them he'd planned to go to a synagogue wearing a trench coat stuffed with explosives and get himself "as close to children and the rabbi as Australia 4 possible." October 25, 2004 FBI agents in Tennessee arrest farmhand Demetrius "Van" Crocker after he _______________ allegedly tried to purchase ingredients for deadly sarin nerve gas and C-4 plastic explosives from an undercover agent. The FBI alleges that Crocker, who local officials say was involved in a white supremacist group in the 1980s, tells the agent that he admires Hitler and hates Jews and the government. He allegedly also says "it would be a good thing if somebody could detonate some sort of weapon of mass destruction on Washington, D.C." Crocker is charged with trying to get explosives to destroy a building and other charges, and faces more than 20 years in prison if convicted. March 25, 2005 Congregation Micah in Brentwood Tennessee received an envelope with a white powdery substance and a threatening letter which also threatened other institutions in the area. The FBI took control of the suspicious package, which was sent to a state crime lab in Nashville for testing. Congregation services and activities were canceled or postponed pending the outcome of testing for Anthrax. April 13, 2005 The U.S. government unsealed an indictment by a federal grand jury in Manhattan charging three British nationals with conspiring to use weapons of mass destruction, providing material support and resources to terrorists, and conspiring to damage and destroy buildings as part of a plot to attack financial institutions in New York, New Jersey, and Washington. Dhiran Barot, a.k.a. Abu Eisa al-Hindi, 32, Nadeem Tarmohammed, 26, and Qaisar Shaffi, 25, are accused of conducting surveillance on prominent financial buildings between August 2000 and April 2001. There is no mention of Al-Qa`ida in the indictment, but the September 11 Commission Report said that Al-Qa`ida leader Khalid Shaikh Mohammed sent Barot to Malaysia to receive terrorist training and, at the direction of Usama Bin Ladin, sent him to the U.S. “to case potential economic and Jewish targets in New York City.” The three suspects are among a group of eight terrorism suspects arrested in England in August 2004 and currently await trial there on terrorism-related charges. May 20, 2005 Officials in New Jersey arrest two men they say asked a police informant to build them a bomb. Craig Orler, who has a history of burglary arrests, and Gabriel Garafa, said to be a leader of the neo-Nazi World Church of the Creator and a member of a racist Skinhead group called The Hated, were charged with illegally selling 11 guns to police informants. Carafa allegedly gave one informant 60 pounds of urea to use in building him a bomb, but never said what the bomb was for. Police say they moved in before the alleged bombing plot developed further because they were concerned about the pair's activities. They taped Orler saying in a phone call that he was seeking people in Europe to help him go underground. August 30, 2005 Sean Gillespie was sentenced to 39 years in prison for firebombing a Jewish temple in Oklahoma City and later trying to send a racist letter to the congregation. Gillespie, 21, of Spokane, Wash., was found guilty in April of three bombing-related charges for hurling a Molotov cocktail at Temple B’Nai Israel a year earlier. Gillespie’s sentence was lengthened because of the letter he attempted to send to the temple after his conviction. The letter, which was read in court, expressed hatred toward the Jewish people and a desire to spark a racial holy war. September 1, 2005 A federal grand jury here indicted the head of a radical Islamic prison gang and three other men on charges of conspiracy to wage war against the U.S. government, conspiracy to kill service members and foreign officials, and other related crimes. According to charging documents Kevin James tried to recruit his fellow inmates into the group, which preached a radical version of Islam that called for members to attack any perceived enemies of the faith. Authorities allege that the group planned to stage two pronged attacks against military recruiting centers and synagogues during Yom Kippur. September 29, 2005 Racist Radio Program Host Hal Turner suggested to his readers in an internet chat room to begin “drawing up lists of Jewish Yeshivas here in the United States.” Readers’ comments suggested threats and targeting of specific New Jersey Shuls and Yeshivas, citing “With winter weather comes winter coats,” wrote someone called “A-Bomb.” “With winter coats comes concealed weapons. With concealed weapons comes dead yeshiva students.” October 25, 2005 Iraqi-born Krispy Kreme worker Ahmed Hassan Al-Uqaily was sentenced to 4 years and nine months in prison for purchasing machine guns and grenades to target Jewish facilities in Nashville. Al-Uqaily made a threat about “going jihad” and expressed animosity toward Jews and identified two Jewish facilities that he knew about. November 4, 2005 Jewish Defense League Activist Earl Krugel, 62, was killed while serving time in a Federal Prison in Arizona for his role in a 2001 bomb plot against the King Fahd Mosque in Culver City and a field office of Lebanese-American Congressman Darrell E. Issa. Krugel, who had been serving his 20 year sentence in protective custody at Los Angeles’ federal Metropolitan Detention Center, was transferred to the medium security prison in Phoenix three days prior to his murder. Krugel’s lawyer, Mark Werksman indicated that previous death threats have been made against Krugel “because he was a militant Jewish activist”, but Werksman could not recall the details of the threats, only suggesting that Krugel “might have been targeted by white supremacists or Muslim extremists in the past.” November 22, 2005 A Nashville woman who threatened to spread anthrax and blow up public places — such as city buses, shopping malls, synagogues and churches — pleaded guilty yesterday, federal prosecutors said. Piettia Heifner York admitted she had made 17 threats between March 25 and April 15 and pleaded guilty to one charge of making a bomb threat, prosecutors said. (See March 2005 Event for Details) Canada October 23, 2004 The president of the Canadian Islamic Congress issues a statement saying all Israelis above the age of 18 are legitimate targets of attack. Mohamed Elmasry made the comments on the Michael Coren Live TV Show and received heavy criticism from Canadian Jewish and Muslim groups alike. January 18, 2005 Sleiman Elmerhebi was charged with firebombing a Jewish Elementary school in Montreal and sentenced to 40 months in jail. Elmerhebi pleaded guilty to starting a fire that destroyed the library at the United Talmud Torah School, claiming his actions were a result of an emotional reaction to the situation in the Middle East. March 27, 2005 Two teachers at an Islamic school in Canada who praised a pupil's essay about killing Jews with hand grenades and machine guns have been suspended for allegedly inciting racial hatred. The essay drew praise from one of the teachers of Arabic at the Abraar Islamic School, who wrote on the story: "God bless you, your efforts are good. The story of the hero Ahmed and the hero Salah is still alive. The end will be soon when God unites us all in Jerusalem to pray there." The teacher's name has not been released. October 6, 2005 Burhan Azzeh, Co-president of the Niagara Palestinian Association, was arrested for allegedly making a terrorist threat against the Jewish community. “Maybe it’s time to blow up some Jews,” Burhan Azzeh – husband of the other co-president, Susan Howard-Azzeh – is reported to have told co-workers at his job on the Welland Canal. November 3, 2005 Canadian counter- terrorism investigators have dismantled a suspected terrorist cell in Toronto whose members included an al-Qaeda-trained explosives expert. The cell consisted of four Algerian refugee claimants who had lived in Canada for as long as six years and were alleged members of a radical Islamic terror faction called the Salafist Group for Call and Combat. The central figure of the Toronto-area cell was a former al-Qaeda training camp instructor who studied bomb-making at Osama bin Laden's Al Farooq and Khaldun training camps in eastern Afghanistan. United Kingdom December 13, 2004 Scotland Yard believes terrorists could be planning a massive gas bomb in London. Officials believe that the left of 10 large propane gas canisters may be linked to al-Qaeda. In April 2002, al-Qaeda terrorists drove a truck loaded with propane bottles into a Tunisian synagogue, killing 14 German tourists. April 15, 2005 British security services contend that a group of Algerian terrorists, trained in Al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan established a poison factory in an apartment in north London with the intent of targeting the Jewish community among other targets in north London. July 5, 2005 Muslim cleric Abu Hamza al-Masri faces trial at a London court today on 15 criminal charges including encouraging the murder of Jews and other non- Muslims and possessing a document that could be useful to terrorists.