Hunting for Sleeper Cells

Sept. 30, 2002
By Mark Miller and Mark Hosenball

—  Criminal bail hearings in federal court can sometimes stretch on for hours. The lawyers bicker about how much money the accused should pay to go free until trial, and the judge prolongs the proceedings with endless questions. But even by those standards, last week’s marathon session to decide the fate of the “Buffalo Six” was unusual.  

       FOR TWO-AND-A-HALF days, federal prosecutors tried to convince federal Magistrate H. Kenneth Schroeder Jr. that the young men, all Americans of Yemeni descent, were members of a Qaeda sleeper cell who trained in an Afghanistan camp in the summer of 2001. They were taught how to shoot Kalashnikovs, attended a fiery anti-American speech by Osama bin Laden—and then, the government claims, returned home to Lackawanna, N.Y., to patiently await orders from the terrorist mastermind.

        The judge, a 66-year-old skeptical former prosecutor himself, repeatedly interrupted the lawyers with questions. “What is it the defendants were planning?” he demanded. “The government must establish that danger by clear and convincing evidence.”


After Afghanistan
Osama bin Laden called his network Al Qaeda "the Base" because he saw it as a headquarters operation for a much wider terror movement. But will the organization be able to thrive without Afghanistan as its haven, and if bin Laden and other key leaders are eradicated? A primer:

Money
* BEFORE: Qaeda funding was controlled by a central finance committee and funneled illegally through banks and charities.
* NOW: International crackdown on terrorist assets means funds are less likely to be available for cell activities. 


Communication
* BEFORE: Cells communicated with each other and Qaeda leaders via satellite phones, cell phones and e-mail.
* NOW: New anti-terrorism laws in the United States, Britain and elsewhere make it easier to arrest those heard of by intelligence officials as engaging insuspicious communication. 

Terror Cells
* THEN: Usually composed of four or five members, Qaeda cells planned, supported and carried out terror attacks.
* NOW: Without a global support network, their effectiveness probably will be diminished. 

Other Cells
* BEFORE: Cells operated independent of one another and needed a facilitator on the scene to coordinate an attack.
* NOW: With leadership and communication abilitieshampered, it may be more difficult for cells to coordinate and carry out major attacks. 

Leadership
* BEFORE: Bin Laden and his trusted lieutenants, safely entrenched in Afghanistan, controlled the various pieces of Al Qaeda and coordinated cells around the world.
* NOW: Whoís running the show? With bin Laden in hiding and some of his top lieutenants wounded or killed, itís doubtful the leaders who remain are providing much direction. 

Recruits
* BEFORE: Bin Laden operatives were recruited from mosques around the world and brought to Afghanistan for training. They were then sent to various countries to help existing cells or to start new operations.
* NOW: With no place to train, strong recruitment drives are less likely; cells will suffer without the infusion of fresh recruits.

        The prosecutors admitted they had no evidence that the men were planning to carry out terrorist strikes. They claimed one of the men sent a cryptic e-mail to a friend hinting at a future attack: a “big meal” was coming, he wrote. “No one will be able to withstand it, except people of faith.” The lawyers also introduced a rifle and a tiny pistol they’d found in his home.

        Defense lawyers painted a far different picture, of religious, working-class men who went on a spiritual pilgrimage, not a terrorist training mission. “Each of our clients denies that he was ever a member of Al Qaeda,” defense lawyer James Harrington told the court. Only two of the defendants have admitted they were in the camp. Others insist there’s no evidence they went beyond Pakistan.

        The Justice Department credited unnamed sources inside Lackawanna’s Yemeni community with telling the FBI that the men had been overseas, and held up the tip as an example of how Muslim Americans are partners in the war on terror. It was an important symbolic victory for the Feds, who had taken heat after 9-11 for alienating Muslim communities instead of working to win their trust.

        When the hearing concluded Friday night, Schroeder seemed unconvinced that the government had made its case. “I haven’t heard of any acts of violence or a propensity to acts of violence in the history of these defendants,” he said. The judge questioned whether the men had really “provided” support to Al Qaeda, or merely “received” it. He also asked why prosecutors waited until the Sept. 11 anniversary week to arrest the men, if they believed them to be so dangerous. Yet the judge also seemed reluctant to release the men. The prosecution’s larger, more ominous point—what if they are terrorists, and we let them go?—was clearly on his mind. Ultimately, he said he’d rule on the matter by Oct. 3.

        Privately, Justice officials realize that arresting suspected terrorists before there’s harder evidence of a crime could put them on shaky legal footing. “We’re paving some new ground, so there’s a little bit of nervousness about the case,” says one law-enforcement official. “There’s always a dilemma in law enforcement. You want to keep an investigation going as long as you can and identify all the conspirators. But you don’t want to wait until disaster strikes.”

        Not surprisingly, civil libertarians are troubled by the Buffalo case, and worry it could erode a basic constitutional right: freedom of association. But the courtroom drama playing out in Buffalo may be just a hint of things to come. Justice Department officials fear that dozens of sleeper cells, with hundreds of members, may be quietly plotting the next attack from within our borders, and Attorney General John Ashcroft has vowed to root them out—even if that means stretching the limits of the law. “We don’t have the luxury to take chances,” a source close to Ashcroft told NEWSWEEK. “If we could have locked up Mohamed Atta before 9-11, do you think people would criticize us? We’re going to do whatever we have to do to hold them until we find out who they really are.”

        It could be a long wait. Even friends and neighbors can’t quite sort out how six men from Lackawanna could have wound up in a Qaeda training camp. Once a thriving industrial town, the Buffalo suburb fell on hard times during the ’80s. Many of the 19,000 people who didn’t abandon the town now scrape by in low-paying jobs, including a community of 3,000 Yemeni immigrants. Most of the six suspects grew up within a few blocks of each other in Lackawanna’s tight-knit Yemeni neighborhood.

        As teens, they liked to drive fast, party and pick up girls. But neighbors say sometime during or after high school, the young men became, in varying degrees, more devout. They stopped drinking, swore off sex and began praying five times a day at the local mosque. Some neighbors describe one of the men, 25-year-old Yahya Goba, as the group’s spiritual adviser. Goba, who wears his traditional beard long and untrimmed, was born in the United States, but spent several years in Yemen on his family’s farm. When he returned to the town, he became a mentor to neighborhood kids, schooling them in the ways of Islam.

        In spring 2001, members of a Muslim evangelical group invited the men to attend a religious gathering in Pakistan. According to prosecutors, the men paid $1,300 for plane tickets and spent a week in Karachi, where they apparently studied and prayed. —From there, things become a bit murky. In Pakistan, federal officials say, the men met up with another Lackawanna friend, an Islamic activist named Kamal Derwish. At the time, Derwish was allegedly living in the Middle East, and later underwent advanced weapons training in bin Laden’s Al Farooq camp. Derwish invited the men to come to Afghanistan, and allegedly arranged for them to be driven over the border to the camp. (Derwish and eighth suspect Jaber Elbaneh, who are believed to be in hiding in Yemen, are still being sought by the United States.) At the camp, the men underwent a few weeks’ training in combat skills. One day, bin Laden showed up to inspire his new recruits to wage jihad against the United States and Israel. A few weeks later, they went home.

        Almost as soon as they returned, the Feds were on their trail. In the months that followed, the authorities interviewed some of the men several times, and followed them in unmarked cars. “You’d have to be blind to miss [the agents],” says Lackawanna Police Chief Dennis O’Hara. Though they didn’t see evidence of terrorist activity, the Feds did wonder where several of the men got large amounts of money. Officials are especially curious how 24-year-old Yasein Taher, who was fired from his job as a bill collector, could afford a new Mustang convertible and a sleek Ninja motorcycle. The Feds say Taher’s friend, 24-year-old Shafal Mosed, spent $89,000 at a nearby Canadian casino—though he claimed his only income came from his job as a telemarketer. (His lawyer says the total may include large sums spent by his friends.)

        The Feds got a break on Sept. 11 of this year when one of the men, 22-year-old Mukhtar Ali Albakri, was arrested in Bahrain the morning after his wedding, and beaten up by local police. He was later turned over to the FBI, and admitted that he’d been to the Qaeda camp. He also named some of the others. It was Albakri who sent the mysterious “big meal” e-mail that the Feds now say was possible evidence of a coming attack.

Albakri’s lawyer says prosecutors misunderstood the missive. He claims the “big meal” was actually a warning about a rumored attack in Afghanistan itself. Albakri’s lawyer says the puzzled recipient of the e-mail wrote back to Albakri: “What are you talking about? What is this meal? Do you mean a hamburger or what?”

        Back in Lackawanna, agents interviewed another member of the group, 29-year-old Sahim Alwan. He, too, admitted he’d been to the camp—but he told the Feds he had been desperate to leave from the moment he realized what he’d gotten himself into. Alwan claimed he’d begged his hosts to let him go, and even faked an ankle injury to get out of training. He was allowed to leave after about 10 days—weeks earlier than the others.

        Agents soon arrested Alwan. The Feds then fanned out across the Buffalo area and arrested the four others. One friend of the men, who asked not to be identified, told NEWSWEEK that at least some people in the community knew they were going to Afghanistan—though not necessarily to the camps. “I knew they were going, to learn more about Islam. I don’t think anyone thinks that’s a crime.” Maybe not in Lackawanna. In Washington, however, there are plenty of people who believe it’s a crime that should get them 15 years.

With Nada El Sawy and Daniel Klaidman
http://www.msnbc.com/news/811207.asp