| Bin
Laden is still alive and clearly acting as head of Al Qaeda, says CSIS
Translator at Mohamed Harkat Bail Hearing. See also: CSIS statement in June 2005 that contradicts the testimony of this witness. CSIS: "The elimination of its geographical base and the arrest/deaths of some of its leadership and senior cadre has led to a radical transformation," it reads. "Al-Qaeda is not what it once was. As an 'organization,' it no longer exists." By YayaCanada  OTTAWA - Wed. Nov. 2, 2005:
An
articulate, multilingual CSIS translator portrayed in the drawing at
right, sworn in only as "P.G." to protect his identity, said in Supreme
Court today that "Bin Laden is alive and well and in control of Al
Qaeda". He said this during an explanation of "Islamic extremism"
that Judge François
Lemieux, who is
presiding over the Mohamed Harkat bail hearing in progress, had
requested because this witness had used the term "over and over" in his
testimony.That makes it official, one must suppose. The hunt for OBL can still be seen to be on, even if he really is dead. Would it make any difference if he were dead, asked CSIS counsel? Not at all. Alive he is "a symbol, a paragon" and "if he were killed he would be a martyr", said P.G. In any case, "Al Qaeda has already set the standard". According to P.G. there are three levels of Al Qaeda: 1. The core Bin Laden group; 2. Affiliated extremists, some of which set up their own trainings camps in the 1990's, but had the same goals such as the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group - LIFG. 3. Loosely connected groups that are "inspired by Al Qaeda", with no formal link to it, but who believe in the "Al Qaeda ideology". This would include the terrorists responsible for the bombing in Madrid in March 2004 and the London bombers of July 7, 2005, who were found to have no known link to Al Qaeda yet their purpose was "consistent with the goals of Osama Bin Laden". These three make up the Bin Laden network, and all "have a personal allegiance to him". What motivates Osama Bin Laden; what does he hope to achieve, asked Judge Lemieux? Bin Laden comes from Saudi Arabia, responded P.G., and his initial motivation derived from the fact that US troops were allowed to be stationed on the soil that gave birth to Islam. How does that translate into a direct threat to the west? Al Qaeda has four goals: 1. To remove the US troops that are "a blot or a stain" on Islam; 2. To remove western cultural and economic influence from the Middle East; 3. To overthrow Arab regimes and recreate the Caliphate; 4. To establish "global Islam" - which P.G. says will not happen overnight, but Al Qaeda is prepared to work for as long as it takes to this end. And there we have it. History's reasons for imperialist warfare down through the years - such as the Yellow Peril and the Red Menace - have been replaced by the spectre of Global Islam, and not a moment too soon for the PNAC's plans to achieve US global domination. Up until the 1990's, P.G. said, Bin Laden had focused on the "near enemy versus the far enemy". His plan had been to establish Islamic states in Egypt, Indonesia, Algeria and Saudi Arabia, but that "didn't go well so he he decided to strike the far enemies, to convince the west to abandon its support for the Middle East regimes". "It is the Service's belief," continues P.G., "that individuals who are part of the Bin Laden network maintain those ties for a very long time; the relationships mean a great deal and dedication to the ideology is very strong and virtually impossible to break". Does "notoriety" have any effect on their usefulness to Al Qaeda, asked counsel for CSIS. Little or none, responded P.G., and he went on to cite the case of Ahmed Said Khadr ( whose family, although proud of their professed Al Qaeda connections, remain oddly free on Canadian soil, while other Muslims who have denied any connection at all with Bin Laden are languishing in jails ). Mr. Khadr gained notoriety by being imprisoned in Egypt for allegedly participating in an attempt to overthrow Gamal Abdel Nasser (of whom the United States became not so fond because he turned to the Soviets for help when Egypt was invaded by British, French and Israeli forces) "but when he was released", said P.G., "he returned to extremism", this time in Afghanistan, and was eventually killed in "an anti-terrorist operation". There is a "complete embrace to an ideology", said P.G., that no amount of incarceration would ever diminish. How is this ideology inculcated, asked CSIS counsel. "There is no cut and dried process", replied P.G. "It varies from individual to individual." There are training camps, the Internet, veterans of various campaigns. They learn from their families, as in the case of the Khadr sons. "There is no series of steps." An Al Qaeda member does not have to attend a training camp in Afghanistan to "still be fully capable of carrying out heinous acts". Is Harkat likely to have been deterred by incarceration? "It is our belief", replied P.G., "that incarceration makes no difference. Harkat would continue to pose a threat." Defence Counsel, Paul Copeland, begins his cross examination by eliciting information about P.G.'s background... P.G. studied languages at Western University; he knows about a dozen of them - doesn't speak them all fluently, but can read and interpret them. This got him a job right out of university with Canada's Communications Security Establishment - CSE. Within two weeks of working there, he was able to extract and translate intelligence data and use it to write a report for senior members of government. How did you know whether you did a good job on that, asked defence counsel. Because my superiors approved it and the government accepted it, P.G. replied. Had he studied anything other than languages in university? No. Then how could he have known where to place the value in the reports he translated? By being trained on the job - working beside someone who had years of experience; being mentored. Were there any courses offered by CSE on Middle East issues, and if so what were they called? Yes there had been, but P.G. had no recall of what their titles were. Had he taken any courses on Islamic extremism? P.G. replied that he "had no time" to do that, but he had attended numerous conferences, such as the annual conferences of the Middle East Studies Association - MESA, and had himself made many presentations on the Middle East to the domestic intelligence community. Was there any oral information passed on to him, or any reading that he had done? P.G. initially replied that he was unable to answer that on the grounds of "national security", at which there were a few audible titters from the cheap seats. (I've been painfully aware that in court, the general public sits on hard wooden benches while the lawyers sit on upholstered chairs, and the judge no doubts sits on a pillow made of the finest imported pheasant feathers. Sophie Harkat has been in court so much, she has taken to removing her shoes and sitting cross legged on the bench so that her back gets a bit of support.) When coaxed a little by the Judge, P.G. finally responded that he had done a lot of self informing through reading books such as Dilip Hiro's on the Iran-Iraq war, and he did seem knowledgeable about the overthrow of the Shah of Iran, and had read accounts that the US had provided "military materials" to the Mujahadeen in their fight in Afghanistan against the Soviets - at which time, he said, Osama Bin Laden "happened" on the scene - and of the ancient history of Islam and of terrorism in general. P.G. went to work for CSIS on January 1, 2001 as a Senior Middle East Analyst with a focus on Islamic extremism - just in time for 9-11. CSIS apparently works from the premise that the attacks on the World Trade Center towers were carried out according to the official, unproven story, that 19 young Muslim suicidal geniuses somehow got past the greatest "intelligence" in the world and hijacked four jumbo jets using only plastic boxcutters as weapons, and expertly flew them into precise targets with barely any flight training to their credit, and did such a bang up job that the towers, and even a building they hadn't hit, crumbled into a fine dust. The Bin Laden network "Al Qaeda" is behind almost all of the terrorism going on in the world, according to CSIS. P.G. apparently also believes in the authenticity of the Bin Laden tapes, since he cited them to show that Bin Laden had included Canada in his threats - "for its collusion in the war on terror." Defence counsel spent most of the time today eliciting information from P.G. to show how much he really knew about the background to Islamic extremism and the case of Mohamed Harkat. Among other questions, lawyer Paul Copeland asked: Would you say that Al Qaeda flows out of the situation where the Mujahadeen were fighting the Russians in Afghanistan? "Partially yes", was the answer. "There are many veterans of the Soviet war in Al Qaeda, but not all of the ideology came from that." P.G. went back as far as the 13th Century to the writings of Ibn Taymiya which he says are cited by Bin Laden, and moved forward to the 18th Century and Wahhabism, the Saudi version to which Bin Laden was an adherent. Finally, in the 20th Century, it all culminated in the Muslim Brotherhood which, said P.G., is the "father of modern extremist ideology". Prominent among them was Sayyid Qutb an Egyptian teacher in the Ministry of Education during the 30s and 40s, who went to the US in the 1950's to study at Colorado State College of Education, and apparently was not impressed by western ways. "He wrote the bible for Islamic extremism, said P.G., "a book called "Milestones" that contained the "seeds of extremist ideology". All to say, one must assume, that extremism is simply inherent in Islam and not the result of any western interference at all. Was the Muslim Brotherhood legal during Nassar's time, asked defence counsel. Not sure, I think so, was the response. (Actually it was and it was not. It was Nassar who finally outlawed it.) Part II - Continuation of cross
exam - November 3rd
Part III - Conclusion of cross exam - November 3rd Summations - November 4th yayacanada.com Main Page - "Abolish the Security Certificate" |