Think Globally, Terrorize Locally

A sweeping publication ban has just been lifted, and some new details have come to light about the leader of Toronto 18 and his, ahem, international connections. From the Ceeb:

...In hundreds of hours of taped phone intercepts and secretly recorded conversations with police mole Mubin Sheik, Ahmad spoke enthusiastically of building an arsenal of high-powered weapons, including AK-47s and M-16s, and of attacking Canadian targets such as the Pickering nuclear power plant in Ontario and storming Parliament in Ottawa to "cut off some heads."

What the jury and the Canadian public didn't hear about was the story of Ahmad's ties to international terrorism.

Before turning his attention to building a Canadian al-Qaeda style terrorist cell, Ahmad was plotting acts of terrorism with alienated young Muslim men like himself in the United States, the United Kingdom and perhaps beyond.

One of those young men was Aabid Khan, who was an al-Qaeda supporter and recruiter living in Bradford, England. According to British security analyst Sajan Gohel, Khan was no foot solider, but a plotter who put together terrorism cells on the internet.

Khan was arrested by British anti-terrorism police at Manchester International Airport on June 6, 2006, just four days after the RCMP busted the Toronto 18.

Khan had been returning from one of his frequent trips to Pakistan. On his laptop computer and on 53 hard drives found at his home, police discovered what a British prosecutor later referred to as a library of violent jihadi videos and Islamist propaganda tracts. Among the videos police discovered was an edited two-minute feature shot at a Canadian winter indoctrination and military training camp organized by Ahmad and by Toronto 18 co-leader Zakaria Amara at Washago, Ont.

U.K. police also found hundreds of hours of saved chats between Khan, Ahmad and other members of the Toronto 18.

Lucky for us only an infinitesimal fringe of Pakistani immigrants speak enthusiastically of building an arsenal of high-powered weapons, including AK-47s and M-16s, and of attacking Canadian targets such as the Pickering nuclear power plant in Ontario and storming Parliament in Ottawa to "cut off some heads"--and then only because they've drastically misunderstood their religious lessons.