Canadian pols say more arrests are on the way

posted at 11:18 am on June 5, 2006 by Allahpundit
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How far does it go?

Despite the arrests, and police assurances that the threat allegedly posed by this group had been “removed,” security officials are still grilling individuals who may be connected, or may have vital information about the alleged plot to bomb targets in Ontario. Reports suggest those targets may have included the Toronto headquarters of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and the CN Tower, as well as Parliament Hill.

“It’s not over,” said Liberal Senator Colin Kenny, who as chair of the Senate’s national security committee, was briefed on the raids. “It’s very much stay tuned.”

The same article notes that the type of ammonium nitrate ordered by the suspects was the highest grade for making explosives.

Meanwhile, the image of the eldest suspect — the one who led prayers at the mosque that Toronto PD didn’t know existed — is coming into focus. Surprise:

Six of the men arrested in Friday’s anti-terrorism sweep were among those who spent time with Jamal at the centre and hung on his every word…

Sources say that during the 2004 federal election campaign, Jamal told members that Islam “forbid” participation in politics and more recently accused Canadian soldiers of going to Afghanistan to rape women…

Although many have described Jamal as soft-spoken, it was his outspoken Wahhabist views — a fundamentalist Sunni movement — that had in recent years alarmed some of the directors at the centre, which is non-sectarian. But because he was a volunteer who took on the role of “caretaker,” his services were valued.

Some local Muslims point to a much wider problem:

“So many people in our community think it is not here, that it is nothing to worry about,” said Ahmed Amiruddan, chairman of the Ahlus Sunnah Foundation of Canada. “I keep saying, you have to be careful of extremist ideology. It is in our community. More than 80 per cent of our mosques are being penetrated by these guys,” he said.

Salman Hasan, director of the Islamic Foundation of Toronto, a large Islamic centre, said he has recently found some members of his mosque exhibiting signs of extremism, but dismisses them as misguided young men.

“They were just like other confused young minds that needed love and guidance,” he said Sunday.

I’m looking for more news. Standby for updates.

Update: It wasn’t just a friend of the Khadr family who was in court on Saturday. Zaynab Khadr, sister of Abdullah, made a cameo appearance. “Canada’s hard-line Muslims can seem a pretty tight-knit group at times,” notes report Colin Freeze, drily.

Freeze actually met one of the suspects last year when he went to interview his father, an imam, about the anti-crusader nonsense the latter man was spouting from his pulpit. RTWT.

Update: Here’s a must-read from the Globe and Mail, by way of Judeoscope, on the faith’s-got-nothing-to-do-with-it whitewash:

[W]hat came clear at that meeting yesterday, which was an odd mix of community venting and news conference, is that many of those people who went to the microphone to ask questions, and some of those who answered them from the podium, are far more concerned about a possible anti-Muslim backlash to the arrests than they are about the allegations that a whole whack of their young people were bent on blowing something up in the city; that they are generally worked up about Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan and the Americans in Iraq, and that even as they talk about Islam being a religion of peace, they do not sound or appear particularly peaceable.

Update: LGF dug up a Canada.com article about the suspected jihadis’ training camp. I say “suspected” but it’ll interesting to watch their defense lawyers come up with an innocent explanation for this.

Update: There’s always a hitch.

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