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Chellali Benchellali	Chellali Benchellali	Learned Elders of Islam	Europe				20040106
	Chellali Benchellali	al-Qaeda	Europe				20040110

Europe

Court Convicts 25 for France Attack Plan

2006-06-14

The Frenchies aren't shy about rolling up terrorist networks in their own country. Thank you France for this one. PARIS (AP) - A court on Wednesday convicted 25 people for their roles in preparing a terror attack in France in support of Islamic fighters in Chechnya. The five top defendants each received prison terms of eight to 10 years, while the others received lesser sentences. Two were acquitted. All but one defendant had been accused of helping Islamic fighters in Chechnya in what prosecutors said underscored the "globalization of the jihad movement." However, prosecutors were unable to prove the attack was to have involved chemicals even though investigators found equipment and chemicals, including the highly toxic ricin. So it's a B+, not an A, for the prosecutor. The thug boys still end up in jug. The prosecution contended the group was plotting an attack in Paris, but could not define the target. The Russian Embassy, a police station and the Eiffel Tower were mentioned during interrogations. The court gave the maximum 10-year term to the group's alleged chemicals expert, Menad Benchellali. However, Menad's father, Chellali Benchellali, a Muslim prayer leader in the Lyon suburb of Venissieux, received only an 18-month suspended prison term - far lower than the prosecution's demand for six years behind bars. Apple didn't fall far from the tree, did it. "These convictions profit the United States, Algeria and Russia," said Isabelle Coutant, lawyer for defendent Merouane Benhamed. "They have been convicted because they are Muslims." "Everybody keeps picking on us!" The court convicted 24 defendents of criminal association in relation with a terrorist enterprise, a broad charge used by France to sweep wide in bringing terror suspects to justice. One other was convicted of using false papers. The Benchellali family was at the center of the case, with Menad's mother, Hafsa, and brother, Hafed, also convicted for roles in the plot to carry out the Paris attack. Hafed received four years in prison and the mother got a two-year suspended sentence. The terror network was dismantled in two waves. In December 2002, investigators stormed two houses in the Paris suburb of La Courneuve and the nearby town of Romainville. They found gas canisters, fuses, chemicals and a suit to protect against chemical attacks. In January 2004, investigators carried out another raid in Venissieux, finding chemical products, including ricin. They said that raid definitively broke up the network. Prosecutor Anne Kostomaroff said the group was formed in Algeria in 1999, where eight members had refused an Algerian government amnesty plan for Islamic insurgents in the North African country. Various members then traveled to Spain, France, Italy and the border region between Pakistan and Afghanistan, while a core group formed in the Paris region in late 2000 to create a support ring for Islamic militants in the war-ravaged Russian republic of Chechnya. However, the Benchellali family has long been established in Lyon. Imam Benchellali is known to have occasionally used his makeshift mosque on the ground floor of a high-rise building to collect funds for Islamic fighters in Chechnya. For the Chechnyan Widows Ammunition Fund.

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Europe

French Muslim family takes path to militancy

2004-08-02

When Chellali Benchellali moved to France 41 years ago, his path seemed clear enough. Escaping the misery of his native Algeria, he hoped to get a job, marry, raise a family and blend into the French melting pot. He got part way there. But for the last six months, Benchellali has been in a high-security French prison, along with his wife and two of his sons, all accused of helping to plot a Qaeda-style chemical attack in Europe. A third son has just been released from the U.S. detention center at Guantänamo Bay, Cuba, one of four Frenchmen handed over to the French authorities last week. The family's journey from yearning immigrants to alleged Islamic militants - accused of harboring a makeshift laboratory in their suburban Lyon apartment where one son was said to have been trying to make biological and chemical bombs - is an extreme but still emblematic manifestation of a quiet crisis spreading through Europe's growing Arab underclass... Spare me the quiet crises of the downtrodden underclass. You want to be an Arabian, go to Arabia. If you want to be a European, go to Europe.

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Europe

A chemical attack was in preparation in France

2004-01-10

Scuse the Henglish. This is a translation from the French article Looks like the pressure is being applied pretty heavily on France. What’s the betting that Chirac's order on the hijab will be rescinded within a month It is the conclusion which would have reached the policemen of the DST, some days after the interpellations intervened in the region of Lyons within the framework of the inquiry on the "Chechen fields". The detainees it dedicated as well "to the recruitment of future fighters", according to Le Monde. L be policemen of the DST (Direction(management) of the surveillance of the territory), which(who) called to several persons this week in region of Lyons within the framework of the inquiry on the support for the " Chechen fields ", are convinced that a chemical attempt was in preparation in France, according to the daily The World was dated Sunday - Monday. The newspaper asserts that the policemen are convinced that " the family of the imam Chellali Benchellali dedicated itself actively to the preparation of highly toxic products for their distribution(broadcasting) as well as for the recruitment of future Islamist fighters ". The justice also suspects Chellali Benchellali - an imam of district who is the father of Mourad, held(detained) in Cuba, and by Ménad, imprisoned in France to have supplied a logistic support for the members of an operational terrorist group dismantled in December, 2002 to Romainville and to Courneuve ( Seine-Saint-Denis). The Benchellali family and his(her) close relations would have supplied false papers, money(silver), explosives and places of residence to the members of this network which prepared probably one or several attempts, certainly chemical, in Paris against Russian targets, according to the judicial sources. Besides, a girl of Chellali Benchellali was placed in police custody on Friday within the framework of this inquiry, while the imam of Vénissieux (Rhone) and five other persons called on Tuesday are placed under the blow of an arrest warrant to be presented on Monday to a committing magistrate in Paris, as it was learnt on Friday from judicial sources. A seventh person who had been stopped(arrested) on Tuesday by the DST (Direction(management) of the surveillance of the territory), Fatna Merabet, the wife of the new imam of Vénissieux in suburb of Lyons, should be set again at liberty at the conclusion of her police custody, as it was clarified the same sources. When a person is called in more of 200km of the place of the instruction, she can be maintained in detention at the conclusion of her police custody for a duration of four days under the blow of an arrest warrant. It is the case of the six concerned persons whose police custody of 96 hours(o’clock) expires on Saturday morning. They will be presented on Monday to the antiterrorist committing magistrates with the aim of their indictments. On the whole, nine persons, among which a woman, had been indicted the end of December, 2002 in this said file " Chechen fields ". Among them, Ménad Benchellali, indicted for " criminal conspiracy in connection with one terrorist company ". His brother Mourad, him, is at present detained on the American base of Guantanamo in Cuba. It(he) had left France to study the Koran in Pakistan in June, 2001. Chellali Benchellali, his wife Hasfa and their third son, Hafed, the new imam of the big mosque of Vénissieux, Mourad Merabet, and a 27-year-old young man, Abdelwahed Regad, who was used(employed) as controller quality on a hallal slaughterhouse, as well as the sixth person will be transferred on Monday in Paris. These arrests on rogatory commission of the committing magistrate Jean Louis BruguiÚre provoked of numerous demonstration to Vénissieux where from is also native another prisoner of Guantanamo, Nizar Sassi. The representative - mayor of Vénissieux, André Gérin congratulated himself for his part of these interpellations and wished the lock of the Moslem places of prayer situated in cellars and feet of buildings of the conglomeration of Lyons. AP

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Europe

Father of Guantanamo Bay Suspect Detained in...France

2004-01-06

Oaks and acorns... An Islamic cleric whose son is being held at the U.S. prison in Guantanamo Bay was among seven people detained by French security agents Tuesday as part of an investigation into suspected terror networks. The imam, Chellali Benchellali, was arrested at his home in the tough Minguettes high-rise neighborhood of Venissieux, a suburb of the southeastern city of Lyon, said a lawyer for the family. Attorney Jacques Debray said the imam’s wife and one of his sons, Hafid, also were detained in the sweep by the DST, France’s secretive counterterrorism and counterintelligence agency. Another of his sons, Mourad Benchellali, is among six French detainees suspected of ties to the al-Qaida terrorist network who are being held at the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay. I’m sure it was all some dreadful mistake. His daddy’s a preacher man! French agents also arrested a pharmacist from Minguettes who works at a Lyon mosque and another man from the neighborhood, according to an association that supports prisoners at Guantanamo Bay. Police confirmed that five people were detained in Venissieux and said another two were arrested elsewhere in the Lyon region. There were no immediate details about the last two. Some of those detained are believed to have provided logistical support, possibly including false papers, to suspected terrorists, police said, without providing further details. I’ll scout around for more of those details. The arrests were ordered by anti-terror magistrate Jean-Louis Bruguiere, who has been using his sweeping powers of detention and investigation to probe suspected links between Islamic militants in France and rebels in Russia’s breakaway, largely Muslim republic of Chechnya. Bruguiere has previously said that the volatile Caucasus region, including Chechnya and Georgia, has become a training ground for Islamic militants who return to Europe to conduct attacks after being taught how to use chemical weapons and other arms. Now why would a good French Muslim need to go to Chechnya? They only have one kind of cheese and the nightlife is terrible. A third son of the imam, Menad Benchellali, was picked up in the Paris region during a sweep a year ago that authorities said thwarted planned bomb or toxic gas attacks in France and Russia by a terror cell with ties to Chechen rebels and al-Qaida. The December 2002 raids in the Paris suburbs of Romainville and La Courneuve turned up diagrams of chemical formulas for explosives and a substance that could make toxic gas, judicial officials said at the time. Counterterrorism agents also found electronic components, a suit against chemical and biological attacks and radiation, two empty gas canisters and false identity papers. French authorities have said that Menad Benchellali trained with Chechen rebels and met high-level al-Qaida operatives in the former Soviet republic of Georgia, which borders Chechnya. Papa Imam must be proud. Mourad, currently in detention on suspicion of terrorism. Menad, currently in detention on suspicion of terrorism. Hafid, currently in detention on suspicion of terrorism. Sounds like a truly pious family, doing G-d’s work.

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Europe

France may pay for new mosques to beat militants

2003-01-17

Islamic terrorism has forced France to reconsider one of its most fundamental principles, the separation of church and state. It is considering proposals to allow the state to fund the building of mosques, as part of a bold scheme to create a French version of Islam, rather than let France's second biggest religion fall further under the sway of foreign powers, notably Saudi Arabia. A spokesman said: "One cannot be opposed to the foreign financing of places of worship and at the same time do nothing about it." The Frenchies are smart people — seems they should be able to come up with some method of either forbidding it or tightly controlling it. Competing with the Soddies in suberting one's own country seems to be a dead-end street... The French state is not permitted to build places of worship under a 1905 law, the last of a series of anti-clerical measures passed around the turn of the century, but, since September 11, the government has been searching for ways to communicate with and control France's five million Muslims. Pierre Bedier, the minister responsible for property and building law, said: "In 1905, the government thought that Catholics were anti-republican and constituted a menace. Today it is Islam which poses this question. It would be unrealistic not to respond to this concern." So what'd you come up with, Pierre? There are 1,600 mosques in France but most are little more than a small room. But money from Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states has been cascading into France for the funding of Islamic cultural centres and new mosques. The Grand Mosque in Lyons, for example, cost £3 million and was 90 per cent funded from Saudi Arabia. So the princies were kind enough to toss £3 million your way and you just couldn't pass it up? In many areas, local authorities try to foster better relations with Muslims by skirting the 1905 laws and giving them cheap rents or land. The only region exempt from the law is Alsace-Moselle, for reasons dating to the end of the Franco-Prussian war in 1871. This week, the leaders of a new nationally elected Muslim council were welcomed by President Jacques Chirac to the Elysee Palace. "Welcome to the palace. Please leave your firearms with the footman..." The council is similar to ones that exist for Catholics, Jews and Protestants. It gives Muslims a single body which the government can talk to on issues from education and work to mosque building and the harbouring of Islamic terrorists. Governments had been trying since the 1980s to create such a body but it took the terrorist threat and the new interior minister, Nicolas Sarkozy, to make it happen. At the end of last year, M Sarkozy forced France's Muslim leaders into meeting after meeting until they came up with a plan for a central council. Seems like it would have made more sense to disband the other councils, but that's probably just me... M Chirac told the council that in the past he regretted "there was no organised dialogue between Muslim representatives and the French authorities". He hoped that "the Islam of France and the Muslims of France" would "achieve the same status - with equal rights and duties - as all our other citizens". Ummm... It's not the same status they want, Bub... The 16-member council includes a wide range of Muslim opinion, from the westernised to leaders deeply hostile to the West. And what's the proportion? M Sarkozy has said he will do all he can to prevent foreign Muslim clerics from settling in France and preaching militant Islam. It'd be a real good idea to toss the ones you've already got, too... Police already keep a close eye on mosques which might provide cover for terrorists, such as the Abu Bakr mosque in Lyons. Its imam, Chellali Benchellali, an Algerian-born cleric, is the father of two men being held in connection with terrorist investigations. One was arrested last month in Paris, the other was taken by the Americans from Afghanistan to their Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba. Obviously a really devout family...

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