U.S. Offers $10 Million for Pakistani Terror Chief

The U.S. government has offered a reward of up to $10 million for information related to the leader of an outlawed Pakistan-based terrorist group. The bounty was announced Tuesday on the State Department's "Rewards for Justice" website.

Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, founder of the Lashkar-e-Tayibba (LeT), is alleged to be the mastermind of the November 2008 Mumbai terror attacks that killed 166 people, including six Americans. Following the attacks, Saeed was designated a Specially Designated National by the U.S. Treasury.

Testimony presented at the trial last May of a Chicago businessman charged with aiding the Mumbai attacks, indicated that armed militants from the LeT carried out the attacks in collusion with Pakistan's powerful Inter Services Intelligence agency.

Saeed heads the Pakistan-based Islamist charity Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD), which is widely suspected to be a front for the LeT. He is known to have made public statements against the United States, Israel, and India. At a June 2010 anti-Israel rally in Lahore, Pakistan, Saeed predicted the destruction of Israel at the hands of Muslims: "If Israel offers resistance, the armies of the world of Islam will come into action; and Israel will be wiped off the earth."

In 2001, LeT was designated a Foreign Terrorist Organization. In 2008, both the U.S. and the United Nations declared the JuD a terrorist organization.

Brotherhood's Consistent Inconsistency

The Muslim Brotherhood's habit of breaking promises has tilted so far over the edge that some of its own members have resigned in protest.

After promising to seek only about a third of the seats in Egypt's parliament following Hosni Mubarak's fall last year, the group swept into dominance with a near majority after voting in December. Now, after insisting it would not run a candidate for president – and even ousting a member who put his hat in the ring last summer – the Brotherhood Shura Council voted Saturday to offer their No. 2 man for office.

Khairat al-Shater's candidacy won a slim majority from the Brotherhood's internal legislative body, the Shura Council. It was seen as a response to the strong candidacy from Salafist candidate Hazem Salah Abu Ismail.

In response, prominent member Kamal Helbawy resigned, saying the group was following too much in Mubarak's path. He accused the Brotherhood of secretly conspiring with Egyptian military leaders so both can have power in a new Egypt.

"Shater has met with almost all the senior State Department officials and American lawmakers visiting Cairo," the New York Times reported Sunday. "He is in regular contact with the American ambassador, Anne Patterson, as well as the executives of many American companies here, and United States officials have praised his moderation as well as his intelligence and effectiveness."

Similarly, a CNN report cast Shater, a millionaire businessman, as "the driving force behind" Brotherhood statements it would honor Egypt's peace agreement with Israel.

Time will tell how good the Brotherhood's word is on that.

In October, Shater republished a 2004 interview he gave Qatari newspaper al Sharq on his own website that featured showcase some of that "moderation." If his views have changed, it's odd that he would re-publish the article.

He praised "martyrdom operations" as part of the honor of the Muslim people fighting the "unjust Zionist aggressor, backed by the unjust America as well."

In addition, he longs for "the moment which allows us as Muslims in the countries surrounding Palestine to participate in the Jihad against the Jews; because that is a key objective and a key mission for us as Muslims: the rescue of Palestine from the talons of the Zionist and Western project in general, and the liberalization of the Al Aqsa Mosque in particular."

Meanwhile, representatives of the Coptic Church, representing about 10 percent of Egypt's population, withdrew from the committee writing Egypt's new constitution, saying their efforts to influence the document were doomed by the Islamist dominance on the committee.

A delegation of the Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party arrives in Washington this week for meetings with academic and Islamist groups. Maybe someone can muster the temerity to ask why anyone should take their word for anything.

March on Jerusalem Fizzles

There was nothing "out of the ordinary" about Friday's annual Palestinian protest of Land Day, the Israeli Defense Forces [IDF] spokesman said, despite predictions that 2 million Palestinians and activists would swamp Israel's security forces. Many protests both in Israel and the territories were prevented or under attended, while international demonstrations drew few to the cause of "stopping the Judaization of Jerusalem."

The army was "satisfied" about its largely nonviolent reaction to the protests, as well as Palestinian-Israeli security cooperation in preventing the overwhelming spread of protests, said IDF Spokesman Yoav Mordechai. Only one violent protester was killed along the Gaza border, in comparison to 38 deaths that followed illegal infiltrations along the Syrian and Lebanese borders last year. The low turnout also thwarted attempts by Hamas and the Palestinian Authority to draw more demonstrators to officially sponsored rallies.

The event was also a major failure internationally. Jordanian protesters were stopped before they reached the border, and four American members of the anti-Zionist Jewish group Neturei Karta were beaten and verbally abused by some local participants. Lebanese protesters spoke out violently against Israel but did not provoke major reactions at the border, while the ongoing Syrian government crackdown prevented any serious actions there. A rally in Berlin drew around 50 protesters, and rallies in other European capitals and America failed to impress.

Israeli police have already begun to prepare for other upcoming protest days, including Nakba and Naksa days.

Who's In Charge Here? Somalia Edition

Over at Clint Watts' Selected Wisdom, there's an interesting new report breaking down possible leadership scenarios currently playing out within the Somali jihadist group, al-Shabaab. In it, Watts cites a coterie of Shabaab analysts in an attempt to decipher who is controlling the reigns of the al-Qaida affiliate after a bizarre video appeared online two weeks ago showing one of the group's most prominent American faces, Omar Hammami, pleading for his own life.

Shortly after the "urgentmessage" went public, al-Shabaab issued a statement of its own, denying that Hammami was in harm's way.

The strange scenario begs the question: what is going on within al-Shabaab's ranks? Has there been a split between those more aligned with al-Qaida and global jihad and those more focused on the local Somali insurgency against the Somali government and its allied forces? How could it be that a group most known in the West for its recruitment of Western youth into the ranks of jihad now is turning on the very poster boy of that success—and what does it mean for other foreign recruits?

The post—a follow-up to an earlier piece co-written by Watts and Andrew Lebovich of the New America Foundation—attempts to make sense of recent events on the ground.

The author outlines the strengths and weaknesses of three proposed leadership scenarios and concludes that the final outcome for Hammami, no matter how you slice it, is not looking good.

For more, check out Selected Wisdom.

Pakistani Agent Sentenced in Kashmir Lobbying Case

A Virginia man was sentenced Friday to two years in prison, followed by three years of supervised release, in connection with a decades-long scheme to secretly receive millions of dollars from the government of Pakistan to influence U.S. policy toward the disputed region of Kashmir.

Syed Ghulam Nabi Fai was arrested last July for concealing at least $3.5 million in contributions from Pakistan's powerful military intelligence service, the ISI, to lobby the U.S. government's position on Kashmir. Fai pleaded guilty in December to both counts in a criminal indictment that included conspiracy to act as an unregistered agent of a foreign government in violation of the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) and tax violations.

Fai served as the director of the Kashmiri American Council (KAC), a Washington D.C.-based lobbying and public relations firm dedicated to raising awareness about the struggle of the Kashmiri people for self-determination. Court documents claim the ISI annually contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars for KAC lobbying efforts including "campaign contributions to members of Congress, conferences, seminars, opinion pieces to be distributed to newspapers, and Congressional trips to Kashmir."

Fai's co-defendant Zaheer Ahmad, an American citizen living in Pakistan at the time, helped transfer money to the KAC from the ISI and the government in Pakistan through middlemen (straw donors) operating businesses and charities. The straw donors were reimbursed by Ahmad for their supposed "donations" to the KAC. Ahmad died of a stroke in September.

In his plea agreement, Fai admitted that from 1990 through July 2011, he secretly obtained funds from the Pakistani government, including the ISI, to run the KAC. In various statements to federal law enforcement, he concealed his funding source. In March 2007, Fai denied being affiliated with any officials of the ISI to FBI agents. In a 2009 IRS tax return for the KAC, he falsely claimed the organization had not received any funding from foreign sources in 2008. In addition, in an April 2010 letter to the Justice Department, Fai falsely declared, "KAC or I never engaged in any activities or provided any services to any foreign entities."

The Investigative Project on Terrorism reported earlier on Fai's ties to a leading Hamas front group in the U.S. Fai has also been alleged to channel funds to the Hizbul Mujahideen that has been designated by Indian and European authorities as a terrorist organization.

"Mr. Fai spent 20 years operating the Kashmiri American Council as a front for Pakistani intelligence," said U.S. Attorney Neil MacBride in a Department of Justice press release. "He lied to the Justice Department, the IRS and many political leaders throughout the United States as he pushed the ISI's propaganda on Kashmir."

U.S. Raising Questions on Israeli Military Strike

A new report that Israel might use Azerbaijan to target Iranian nuclear facilities has triggered new Israeli concerns about the Obama administration's handling of Iran. ForeignPolicy.com published a story by journalist Mark Perry highlighting closer military ties between Israel and Azerbaijan, a Muslim-majority nation on Iran's northern border.

Perry, a fervent advocate of U.S. engagement with terrorist organizations like Hizballah and Hamas, is a former adviser to Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat, and his recent reporting on Pentagon decision-making has been marred by questions about its accuracy.

In the Foreign Policy piece, Perry quoted Obama administration officials as saying Israeli-Azerbaijani military ties are heightening the risk of an Israeli strike on Iran.

Perry wrote that senior U.S. intelligence officials "are increasingly concerned that Israel's military expansion into Azerbaijan complicates U.S. efforts to dampen Israeli-Iranian tensions." Closer ties between Israel and Azerbaijan have also "become a flashpoint in both countries' relationship with Turkey," Perry wrote.

A U.S. intelligence officer expressed concern that Azerbaijani defense officials have not explicitly barred Israeli bombers from landing there after a military strike in Iran, removing a significant logistical barrier for the Israel Air Force.

"We're watching what Iran does closely," Perry reported the officer as saying. "But now we're watching what Israel is doing in Azerbaijan and we're not happy about it."

War gaming by American military officials indicated an attack on Iran could draw the United States into a regional conflict, causing hundreds of American casualties.

Perry's report has added to Israeli concerns that Washington is going public to deter Israel from striking Iran. Veteran Israeli defense correspondent Ron Ben-Yishai wrote that "the Obama Administration has decided to take its gloves off."

Ben-Yishai, who spent seven years as Yediot Ahronoth's Washington correspondent, added that in recent weeks that the administration has "shifted from persuasion efforts vis-à-vis decision-makers and Israel's public opinion to a practical, targeted assassination of potential Israeli military operations in Iran. The administration seeks to make it difficult for Israeli decision-makers to order the IDF to carry out such a strike, and what's even graver, to erode the IDF's capacity to launch such [a] strike with minimal casualties."

Congo Awards Hizballah Financier Lucrative Contracts

A Reuters report earlier this month drew attention to Hizballah's expanding business interests in Africa. Highly profitable forest deals have been granted by President Joseph Kabila's government in Congo to a firm led by a Lebanese businessman who allegedly heads another enterprise targeted by the U.S. Treasury as a front for Hizballah.

Last year, Congo's environmental ministry awarded long-term contracts for thousands of hectares of rainforest to the Trans-M company. The Congo rainforest in central Africa is the second largest after the Amazon. Experts believe the contracts have the potential to generate hundreds of millions of dollars in revenues.

Ahmed Tajideen is the leader of Trans-M. His other known business, Congo Futur, was targeted in 2010 by the U.S. Treasury as a front for Hizballah. The company forms part of a larger network of businesses led by Tajideen's three brothers, Kassim, Husayn and Ali. In May 2009, the U.S. Treasury designated Kassim Tajideen as an Africa-based supporter of Hizballah. Kassim "contributed tens of millions of dollars to Hizballah," the Treasury press release said. The funds were sent to Hizballah through Kassim's brother, who served as a commander for the terrorist group in Lebanon. Authorities arrested Kassim in 2003 in Belgium in connection with fraud, money laundering, and diamond smuggling.

Ahmed Tajideen who is not a target of Treasury sanctions denied any connection between Congo Futur and Trans-M and said neither of the companies served as a front for Hizballah. He also denied any association between his brothers and either of the businesses.

"I created both companies independently of each other" Tajideen told Reuters, adding "My brothers have nothing to do with the companies."

A leaked U.S. diplomatic cable from 2000, however, quoted Tajideen saying Trans-M was established by Congo Futur.

Africa is becoming a hub for growing Hizballah activity. Last year, federal authorities accused Lebanese drug dealer Ayman Joumaa in connection with a multi-million dollar cocaine and automobile smuggling enterprise in the United States and West Africa. Profits from the enterprise have been believed to have been routed to Hizballah in Lebanon.

France Slowing Western Embrace of Brotherhood

France's barring of Muslim Brotherhood ideologue Yusuf al-Qaradawi represents a major upset in the group's quest for mainstream European acceptance, argues the Jerusalem Post's Yaakov Lappin. While the United States and other European countries are extending red carpet welcomes to the Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party, France is showing concern about Brotherhood outreach to Muslims at home.

The decision signals a major shift in France's willingness to impede radical Islam at home, Lappin claims, even if banning Qaradawi and other clerics won't stop the international reach of his fatwas. "Sarkozy's decision is about France, and Europe in general, where second- and third-generation Muslims are asserting themselves more and more through Islamist identities," said Esther Webman, a senior research fellow at the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies at Tel Aviv University.

"Qaradawi is an important spiritual leader, maybe the most important, [hence] the message sent by Sarkozy is very important," said Professor Efraim Inbar, director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar-Ilan University. "A major, important European state makes the point that it does not see the Muslim Brotherhood as a moderate movement. The French signal to the West [is] to slow down its attempt to launch a dialogue [with the Brotherhood]."

Qaradawi's International Union of Muslim Scholars hasn't received the blacklisting quietly. The group declared that it was an "insult to all Muslims," a form of Islamophobia, and an attempt to please France's pro-Israel lobby following the Toulouse murders.

NY Man Convicted of Hizballah Support

An Indian citizen living illegally in America has been convicted in New York on five counts of supporting Hizballah and conspiring to traffic in firearms, U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara announced Wednesday. Patrick Nayyar worked with another foreign national who remains at large to deliver weapons, vehicles, and military equipment to the Lebanese terrorist organization.

Between July and September 2009, Nayyar and Conrad Stanisclaus Mulholland agreed to provide equipment for Hizballah to an undercover FBI informant. As part of their agreement, the duo passed the informant a handgun, a box of ammunition and a pick-up truck, believing that the undercover mole was passing the materials on to Hizballah.

Nayyar, a former building superintendant, was also arrested in New York in September 2009 for illegally possessing a handgun and hollow-point bullets.

Nayyar faces 75 years in jail and will be sentenced in September.

Hard Lessons for France in Merah Case

A "reluctance to confront radical Islamists for fear of violating their civil liberties" contributed to French officials' failure to act against Mohammed Merah prior to a series of attacks in Toulouse that killed three soldiers and three children outside a Jewish school last week.

That's the conclusion from Fred Fleitz, former House Intelligence Committee chief of staff in an analysis of the case.

Merah, who was on an American no-fly list, was subject to surveillance by French authorities. But they never built a case that would have allowed his apprehension, writes Fleitz, now the managing editor at the Langley Intelligence Group Network. This is in spite of the fact that his travels to Pakistan and training in Afghanistan were known and after he allegedly he showed explicit jihadist videos to young boys he was trying to recruit, and then threatened to kill a family who complained.

French police did not pursue the incident, Fleitz writes.

Prime Minister Francois Fillon said authorities lacked "evidence that he was a dangerous man."

Merah was killed in a shootout with authorities after a 32-hour siege. In response, French President Nicolas Sarkozy announced a ban on radical imams entering the country, including influential Muslim Brotherhood theologian Yusuf al-Qaradawi.

That will have little effect, Fleitz argues, saying poverty and unemployment among French Muslims makes their community "fertile ground for radical Islamists and home-grown terrorism."

Merah's brother, meanwhile, has been arrested as an accomplice in the killings. An official described Abelkader Merah as "anchored in a radical Islam, favorable toward armed jihad" who exerted considerable influence over his brother.

And his father has threatened to sue the government for failing to capture Merah alive.

Read Fleitz's analysis here.

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