The Obama Administration’s Troubling Amnesia Regarding Germany
Mohammed Haydar Zammar
Suspected of having recruited the members of the Hamburg cell for al-Qaeda and of having run a “travel agency” that organized the trips of al-Qaeda recruits from Germany to Afghanistan.
According to German press reports, the Syrian-born German citizen was under surveillance by German domestic intelligence starting in 1997. According to the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (September 12, 2002 and January 12, 2003), German police questioned Zammar following the 9/11 attacks, but did not arrest him. On October 25, 2001, he was issued a passport by German authorities and two days later he left the country for Morocco. He is currently in prison in his native Syria. (For more on Zammar from the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, see the English translation here.)
Mamoun Darkazanli
On both the U.S. and UN lists of terrorist persons or entities. Darkazanli is a known acquaintance of Hamburg cell members who was suspected of being involved in terrorist financing already before the 9/11 attacks. The 2003 Spanish al-Qaeda indictment identifies him as “the permanent interlocutor and assistant of Osama bin Laden in Germany.” Germany has refused to extradite him and no charges have been brought against him by German prosecutors. He lives in Hamburg.
Reda Seyam
An open proponent of jihad who is suspected by American and Indonesian intelligence of being the al-Qaeda financier of the 2002 Bali bombings. The bombings killed 202 people. In his 2008 memoir Die Abrechnung ["Settling Accounts"], Michael von Wedel, a former agent of Germany’s Federal Office of Criminal Investigations (BKA), writes that his own investigations confirmed these suspicions. Nonetheless, von Wedel was required by his BKA superiors to arrange for the safe passage of Seyam from Jakarta to Frankfurt in 2003. In Germany, Seyam was released. No charges have been brought against him by German prosecutors. He presently lives with his family in Berlin and receives a reported €2300 per month in social benefits. (For more on Seyam, see my forthcoming review of Michael von Wedel’s Die Abrechnung in Policy Review magazine.)
Christian Ganczarski
A known confidante of Osama bin Laden who was convicted by a French court in February of complicity in the April 2002 Djerba synagogue bombing. Some 21 people were killed in the suicide attack. The German convert to Islam was under surveillance by German authorities at the time of bombing. Shortly before the attack, Ganczarski received a telephone call from the bomber asking for his “blessing.” Despite the police surveillance, German authorities brought no charges against Ganczarski and he was allowed to leave the country. He was arrested in 2003 at Paris’s Charles de Gaulle airport.
Cuneyt Ciftci
Suicide bomber who drove a pick-up truck packed with explosives into an American guard post in Khost province in southeastern Afghanistan in March 2008. Two American soldiers and two Afghans were reported killed in the attack. Ciftci left his native Bavaria for the tribal regions of Pakistan in April 2007. He was recruited by the Taliban-affiliated Islamic Jihad Union (IJU). The IJU is known to have sent numerous other recruits from Germany to Afghanistan. (For more, see my “Germany’s Taliban Trail: From Murat Kurnaz to Cüneyt Ciftci.”)
The above list is only a partial one. Numerous other names could be added to it — names like Said Bahaji, Yehia Yousif, Thomas Fischer, and Selcuk Bilgin. Two other better known names could also be added to it: Murat Kurnaz and Khaled Al-Masri (aka Khaled El-Masri). The two German residents have served as “poster children” for the campaign against America’s erstwhile war on Islamic terror. In fact, however, both men have numerous links to Germany’s Islamic extremist scene, and both have in the past been identified as security risks by German authorities themselves. (On Kurnaz, see here and here; and on Masri, see here.)
What the list shows is that Germany’s role as base for the 9/11 co-conspirators was no accident. Germany has been and indeed remains a thriving center of jihadist activism and recruitment. What the list also shows is that German authorities have displayed remarkable indulgence toward the jihadists in their midst — at least as long as these jihadists were planning or implicated in attacks “merely” on foreign soil and not in Germany itself.
For the Obama administration to be asking Germany of all places to take Guantánamo detainees reveals either disdain for American security interests or a strange obliviousness to the threat that German jihadist networks have abundantly demonstrated that they represent.
It is truly as if 9/11 never occurred.
“What was the president thinking when he asked the Germans to take prisoners from Guantanamo?”
Four things:
1. That it would make him look good.
2. That it would increase his power.
3. That it would make him look good.
4. That it would increase his power.
“What was the president thinking when he asked the Germans to take prisoners from Guantanamo?”
It’s called desperation. President Hope&Change is about to be hoisted on his own Guantanamo petard.
Why waste the time money and effort, just leave Guantanamo open and admit that in reality that it is not possible due to national security. This would of course make him have to admit that he was wrong in making such a promise and then as president an executive order in the first place. His inexperience is showing to all the world, and now people are finally saying no to his demands, and it is a good thing!
1. Meryl,
Do you ever get the distinct feeling that DohBama wears mirrors INSIDE of his sunglasses?
Guantánamo was the weirdest ‘red herring’ out of ‘HIS’ campaign. Seriously, wtf, dude?
No worries though. I’m sure there will be some really ‘deep’ article about Doh-Boy consisting of ‘Boxers or Briefs’ and Doh will make some snarky [scripted] joke and there will be giggles/chuckles/clowns and lots of confetti. Then, there will be a cover of Michelle photo-shopped to the hilt with her ‘Aliens’ smile and ‘Proud to be an ‘merican now’ tight dress on, flexing her ‘guns’ [because she has a right to 'bare' arms, haaaaaaaardy-har-puke-har].
But, I repeat myself.
But, I repeat myself.
The masses in Europe are now turning on Obama because his economic policies are hurting recovery in Europe just about as much as thy are in the US.
And the effort to export detainees from Gitmo to Germany won’t help his credibility in Europe either.
Will Obama ever learn that his charismatic charm won’t get the job done anywhere outside of the US?
5. Chip:
“Will Obama ever learn that his charismatic charm won’t get the job done anywhere outside of the US?”
You make it sound as if ‘Bama has actually gotten the job IN the USA. HA! I beg to dif witchya.
-job DONE
I can type. Really. Honest.
Another reason not to ship any terrorists to Germany: A few months after the 1972 Munich terrorist attack during the Olympic Games, the Germans RELEASED the terrorists they had captured. Simply to kiss up to the islamic fascists and Arab dictators.
4. Delia
“1. Meryl,
Do you ever get the distinct feeling that DohBama wears mirrors INSIDE of his sunglasses?”
Yes. Probably with little tiny windshield wipers to keep his view of himself quite clear.
Along with that, his body language sure could provide a thesis for someone to get a doctorate in abnormal psychology. His arrogance makes my skin crawl.
Der ObamanFuhrer said they were safe now.
He has spread his noble words upon them and they were enlightened.
Just the mere blindingly brilliant thought emitted from the lips of the great one is enough to bring a peaceful euphoria to the minds of any formerly oppressed peoples, his apologies for all our horrible evils in the world bringing about true justice.
Remember he can lower the tides, change the temperature, and make the lion lay down with the lamb.
He is god-like in his grandeur worthy of leg-tingling obeisance and so much more.
Once the silly little people in Iran settle down and accept his ministrations, the first meeting between him and fellow community organizer Ahmedinajab will bring peace and love to all.
He’s gonna keep on trying. To keep Gtmo open is to admit BusHitler was right, along with keeping his policies on Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
Of course, he’s changed Bush’s policies vis-a-vis Israel and Iran. How’s that working out for you?
Don’t worry, dear American friends: Guantanamo will be closed, just as your great President promised! Rest assured that Germany will take a number of those prisoners (or maybe all of them?). After all, so I’ve heard, they are mostly just harmless people who just wanted to spend a nice holiday in Pakistan or Afghanistan, some of them most holy wanting to study the Holy Quran; after all, everybody has the RIGHT to do this!? So, Merkel will proudly take them, I fear; after all, this is just the German’s OBLIGATION, after Hitler and the Holocaust!
Okay, let’s pray very hard that Gtmo will not be closed and these nice peaceful people will be able to stay there!
“In the meantime, the German Interior Ministry has made clear that Germany will only accept detainees who have some “connection” to Germany.”
Sure there must be the odd member of the vast Husseini clan around?
Oh! I figured it out! Maybe he thinks Auschwitz is still open for business!
“Oh! I figured it out! Maybe he thinks Auschwitz is still open for business!
”
How VERY funny, smiley included!
Um, no, not funny at all.
Anyways, President Obama has no interest in what happens once the murderers are out of his hands. With the tame media hacks out there, as long as there is a possible out (as in “They had been transferred to German Custody”) he can always spin to to be someone else’s fault.
Actually it’s interesting that Germany is the origin of the September 11, 2001 attacks which precipitated the “war against Islamicist terrorism” and thus the “Islamicism conflict” and also against the Jews as well. In that sense the origins for both are Germany, not somewhere else and although certainly a difference in scale the use of religion as a means of use to invade other countries (Germany used the supposed “problematic Jews” as a “rationale” for why they should be invading other countries in Europe during World War Two)is the same, so there are many parallels.