Weekly Terrorism Spotlight

Volume 1, Issue 4 (April 7)

INSIDE THIS ISSUE:

Islamic charity case resumes in Texas

Holy Land Foundation Islamic charity case resumes in Texas with trial dates set, motion for Israeli intelligence docs

The federal prosecution against accused terrorist sympathizers working for Holy Land Foundation Islamic charity is laid out in a series of trial dates set in a U.S. court in Dallas Texas.

Defense lawyers are also seeking documents from Israeli intelligence sources linked to an IDF military incursion several years ago.

Defendants Shukri Abu Baker, Mohammad El-Mezain, Ghassan Elashi, Mufid Abdulqader and Abdulrahman Odeh will undergo a trial motions and response process through May, and pre-trial materials are due by all lawyers Aug. 1.

They are accused of providing money, laundered through what appeared to be legitimate charities, to terrorist groups such as Hamas, funding attacks against Israel.

The case has an added wrinkle in that the Counsel on American-Islamic Relations has been an un-indicted co-conspirator with Holy Land Foundation.

This situation indicates ties that the Islamic advocacy group known as CAIR has had in sympathy to terrorist organizations such as Hamas.

The schedule for preparation aims at keeping an Aug. 18, 2008 jury trial schedule in the court of U.S. Judge Jorge A. Solis.

Judge Solis indicated he will see both sides in conference on the afternoon of Aug. 6. The preparations build on nearly 1,000 line items of court actions in the trial.

A jury, after a grueling courtroom ordeal lasting several weeks deadlocked on details of the case, resulting in a mistrial ruling in October.

Published reports accused Islamic sympathizers of reaching or having on the jury one or more individuals who created the impasse regardless of the evidence in the case.

The fight continued this week as hearings focused on the quest by defense for information from Israeli intelligence. Judge Solis granted the request.

The U.S. Court stated “its compliments to…the State of Israel,” and asked for “documents and other material seized…from the Palestinian National Authority headquarters in Ramallah.”

The court requested arrangements be made for defense counsel and “an expert witness for the defendants,” to inspect the materials – mainly to translate the documents.

Defense attorneys argued evidence from what Israel took was misused last year. “During the first trial the government introduced approximately 134 of these documents,” defense attorney Nancy Hollander stated in her appeal.

“The situation is simple: the prosecutors and their civilian and Israeli military witnesses all had complete access to the documents seized,” she argued.

“To date, however, the defense has had access to only those documents and other evidence the United States government and the government of Israel decided to provide,”

The tacit accusation is one of covering up what in legal circles is called exculpatory evidence – in this case, by reducing the available documents to smaller sections Hollander said are out of context from the whole body of information.

Israel provided evidence in last year’s trial on activities by local Hamas terrorism-linked “Zakat” committees.

U.S. counter-terrorism experts said the information provided by Israel demonstrated the Zakat committees were in fact controlled by Hamas.

Last year’s jury trial ran from mid-July into late October. A similar-lasting jury trial starting in mid-August may run up against fall holiday scheduling conflicts.

U.S. prosecutors have been seeking the indictment of terrorist funding charges against Holy Land Foundation for more than 30 months.