The Jihad Against Justice

Gordon Kromberg is a lead Federal prosecutor who has led a series of successful investigations into Islamic militants and Muslim groups based in Virginia.

Unfortunately, he's been a little too successful...which is why defense attorneys shilling for Sami Al-Arian, Islamic Jihad's own man in America are playing the race card and trying to get a Federal judge to hold a hearing on whether 'anti-Muslim bias' led to Kromberg and the government's decision to go after a new indictment of Al-Arian in June for contempt for refusing to testify before grand juries pursuing other Virginia-based jihadi organizations:

While the motion claims Muslim terrorism suspects are generally treated unfairly by the Justice Department, Al-Arian's lawyers argue that Mr. Kromberg, 51, has a particularly egregious record of intemperate statements and actions in a series of terrorism-related cases and investigations.

"Defense attorneys have objected for years that Mr. Kromberg, the lead counsel in many of these cases, has been using the Eastern District of Virginia to mete out his own brand of justice for Muslim terrorism subjects, often openly displaying his personal animus," Al-Arian's lead counsel, Jonathan Turley, wrote. "This long and controversial record forms the backdrop for the allegation of selective and malicious prosecution in this case."

Al-Arian's lawyers claim that in 2006, when Mr. Kromberg moved to obtain new testimony from the former professor following his guilty plea in Florida, the prosecutor "became agitated" in response to a defense lawyer's request that the testimony be put off until after the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. "They can kill each other during Ramadan. They can appear before the grand jury; all they can't do is eat before sunset," Mr. Kromberg responded, according to a declaration written by one of Al-Arian's attorneys, Jack Fernandez. Mr. Fernandez said the prosecutor described the request for a postponement as "all part of the attempted Islamization of the American justice system." Mr. Fernandez wrote that he viewed the comments as exhibiting "apparent bias against Muslims."

A look at events during Ramadan in any given year underlines the truth of Kromberg's statement. Muslims do not avoid violence - even against other Muslims — during Ramadan. If you'll recall, Le Petit Jihad in Paris occurred during that time, and so have numerous other incidents. Some 'bias'!

Kromberg also makes the excellent point that there is absolutely no need for our justice system to go out of its way to accommodate Islamists and their beliefs. Therein lies a fairly slippery slope.

Al-Arian's lawyers are also highlighting another case Kromberg worked on the trial of Muslim preacher Ali al-Timimi, who was accused of exhorting others to wage jihad against America and join the Taliban. Kromberg in his arguments brought up the Muslim practice of taqiya, saying that the religious beliefs of the defendant and other witnesses made it acceptable to lie to kaffirs, or nonbelievers..which is in fact the simple truth to anyone who's read the Qu'ran or Hadiths.

"If you are a kaffir, Timimi believes in time of war, he's supposed to lie to you," Kromberg said to jurors. They convicted Al-Timimi of treason and sentenced him to a well deserved sentence of life imprisonment.

To Al -Arian's legal spokesmouths, acknowledging this simple truth was somehow evidence of 'anti-Muslim bias.'

Kromberg also figured prominently in the conviction of the so-called Paintball Eleven, a group of Muslims accused of training in Virginia to fight with a Pakistani terrorist group, Lashkar e-Taiba, in Kashmir. He had a good record there as well with nine out of eleven convictions.

Kromberg later called one of the acquitted men, Sabri Benkahla, before grand juries as a witness on his attendance at jihad training camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Based on his answers, which Kromberg was convinced were more taqiya, the prosecutor got an indictment against Benkahla for obstruction of justice and making false statements to the FBI and the grand juries.

In the case of Al Arian, Kromberg wanted his testimony on another Muslim 'charity', the International Institute of Islamic Thought ( IIIT) in Herndon, Virginia. Court papers said prosecutors haved evidence of financial transfers and money laundering involving the IIIT, various nonprofit groups, including some run by Al-Arian, and terrorist movements abroad, such as Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

That investigation, which has been slowed up by various appeals and court challenges by the defendants has already led to the arrest and guilty plea of Abdurahman Alamoudi, a former Muslim-American political leader and founder of the American Muslim Council who worked for an IIIT connected group called the Saar Foundation on terrorism charges who was sentenced to 23 years in prison.

With a 57 month sentence (which Kromberg rightly referred to as 'a bonanza') to serve followed by deportation, Al-Arian has refused to testify in the IIIT case, which is why Kromberg is seeking to have him indicted for obstruction of justice and why Al-Arian's lawyers are now playing the `Islamophobia ' card in an effort to derail the indictment.

Kromberg strikes me as a dedicated public servant with a refreshingly common sense feel for what jihad and taqiya really mean. His future may be somewhat constrained in a government so concerned with the tender feeling of jihadis and Islamists that they can barely be convinced to utter the words, but the idea that he could be disciplined for bias if the motion by Al -Arian's legal shills is entertained by the court is a sobering one, and an indication of just how devious our enemies and their paid mouthpieces are.

Let'a hope this motion is recognized for the tactic it is and is summarily dismissed.




Hat tip to The Baron.