Youth trying to reach Syria got instructions from Montreal mosque, family members say

MONTREAL—Ten young Quebec Muslims who were detained for allegedly trying to join jihadist groups in Syria received precise travel instructions, financing advice and moral support from individuals they met at a Montreal mosque, family members have alleged to national security investigators.

A source with knowledge of the allegations told La Presse that family members said they received advice so that their travel plans did not appear suspicious. Those instructions allegedly included advice to book tickets on an Italy-bound flight with a stopover in Istanbul. During the layover they were to make their way to the Turkish-Syrian border.

The source said the youths were also advised to get credit cards so that they could book their plane tickets and take out cash advances. The students also allegedly discussed details of their travel plan on a password-protected Internet forum.

No charges have been laid in the case and all 10 youths were released from police custody.

But the latest allegations raise more questions about the Assahaba mosque, which is run by Adil Charkaoui, a Canadian citizen whom security services long suspected of being an Al Qaeda sleeper agent.

Of 21 individuals who have either gone missing, been charged with terrorist offences, or had their passports confiscated in the last six months, at least nine have been linked in some way to Charkaoui or his mosque.

Charkaoui did not respond to questions Friday about the latest allegations, which were not directed at him. But in comments made to the Star earlier this week, he denied any wrongdoing.

“There is a lot of ignorance and malice. When we have both of them together it becomes toxic,” he said. “It’s as if everything that happens related to radicalization in this country is because of a single person.”

Charkaoui was detained and then subjected to restrictive conditions under a federal security certificate that was sought in 2003. He was never charged, the case against him was dropped, and he is suing the federal government over his ordeal.

Of the 10 who were arrested May 15, eight were picked up at the Montreal airport and two were arrested at their homes. Six of them regularly attended the Assahaba mosque.

There were at least two couples. Not all of the 10 individuals knew each other, but some of them knew members of another group of seven teens who went missing and are believed to have fled to the Mideast in mid-January.

Those links are part of an intricate and tough-to-follow portrait of a sprawling Quebecois network made up of young people allegedly drawn to jihad — the opportunity to fight and die for their religious beliefs.

“When you say that everyone knows each other, you’re right, because the Muslim community is one in which the youth meet often at the mosque or at conferences,” said Mahad Jama, who knows several of Montreal’s alleged jihadist figures.

One of Jama’s acquaintances is Sami Elabi, a young man who grew up in the same Montreal suburb of Pierrefonds and has been fighting in Syria since 2013. Jama saw how Elabi’s family was ripped apart by his departure.

Another of Jama’s boyhood friends is Merouane Ghalmi, a former kickboxer whom police believed was on the verge of committing an undisclosed terrorist act when they intervened in February 2015. Ghalmi has now signed a peace bond that forces him to wear an electronic ankle bracelet and bars him from contacting anyone who is in Syria, and individuals connected to a terrorist group.

“For sure it’s shocking because it’s not everyone that leaves that impression,” Jama said of Ghalmi. “When I spoke to him about that he didn’t want to talk much about it.”

One of Ghalmi’s first acts upon returning from the courthouse after signing the peace bond on March 27 was to cut his social media ties to Mohamed Rifaat, a young man with a magnificent voice who was often called upon to sing the Muslim call to prayer.

Rifaat was among those who disappeared in mid-January.

“Did it surprise me? Yes it did. It’s like someone dies that you’ve just met,” said Ishaq Mustaqim, a Muslim convert who credited Islam for turning him away from a life of crime and preached that message in a 2013 social media initiative dubbed Mustaqim TV, to which Rifaat contributed.

“You don’t expect that the person is going to die. I’ve met others who say that it’s not true that he left and others who say that he left but it wasn’t for that. It’s tough to tell what the truth is, but it’s still surprising because it’s someone I knew.”

Radicalization and terrorism experts say there may be others on the periphery of the Quebec cases. Past experience shows that the social networks of terror suspects are often much larger than the list of people who may one day appear in a court room or the pages of a newspaper.

“In the case of the Toronto 18, eighteen were arrested and 11 were convicted, but the fact of the matter is there was a wider circle of about 40 people involved who didn’t reach the level of being prosecuted,” said Lorne Dawson, an expert on radicalization at the University of Waterloo who has conducted in-depth studies of Canadians who have become Islamic extremists.

Of particular interest is what police and researchers call the “facilitators” who may have no intention of carrying out a criminal act, but are considered essential to a flourishing criminal network, be it a case of terrorism or organized crime.

“They are key players in conveying information from one person to another and advising people,” said Dawson. “They often don’t fit with the legal definition of someone police can arrest, but when they do the network analysis, police realize that if these people didn’t exist the whole network wouldn’t happen.”

Bill C-51, the federal anti-terror bill with new laws against those who “promote terrorism,” is believed to go after such figures who “are leading young people to leave the country but themselves aren’t,” Dawson said.

Of the 21 known cases in the Montreal area since January, only two 18-year-olds who were arrested in April, El Mahdi Jamali and his girlfriend, Sabrine Djermane, are facing criminal terrorism charges.

But the others who have had their passports seized are still cause for concern.

“These aren’t wannabes who are just talking. They’ve gone from talking to walking, but they’ve been stopped from walking by the government,” said a former Canadian national security analyst, speaking on condition he not be identified.

A similar situation emerged in the summer of 2014 when Martin Couture-Rouleau, a 24-year-old Muslim convert from St-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Que., was prevented from boarding a flight to Turkey. Officials took away his passport and the RCMP placed him on a list of about 90 other Canadians who posed a high risk of trying to leave the country for terrorist purposes.

Officers met Couture-Rouleau regularly and a local imam offered counselling. By early October, he told investigators he was committed to changing his ways and they believed him. Ten days later he fatally ran down Warrant Officer Patrice Vincent in a parking lot with his car.

“I don’t know what he said because he’s dead, but I’m assuming he said that if I can’t do what I want to do I’ll just go ahead and do it here, and that’s the fear,” the former national security analyst said.

Mystery Facebook account

MONTREAL—A mystery Facebook account with ties to Quebec has re-emerged with a Syria placeline and tips to get to the Islamic State.

The identity of the individual behind the social media account “Lechemin ver l’Islam” (“The Path to Islam”) isn’t known, but the individual has had several social media interactions with at least six Quebecers who have either fled Canada or been stopped by police for allegedly plotting terrorist acts in recent months.

That Facebook account suddenly came to life this week after having been inactive since early January. Starting on Wedneday, the author’s location was listed as Raqqah, Syria, the headquarters of ISIS, instead of Montreal.

On Friday morning, the extremist rhetoric was topped by an offer of personal help facilitating one individual’s passage into the ranks of the terror group.

“You don’t need to know anyone, just a telephone number at the border so they’ll come get you when you’re in Turkey,” the individual wrote in response to a question. “Contact me and I’ll give you the number or that of another brother.”

The existence of the account is significant because of the number of young Quebec Muslims who might see the account. The account makes several references to Quebec, including the Muslim Students’ Association at Université Laval in Quebec City.

The first message from the Facebook account on Wednesday was of his apparent experience as a new ISIS recruit. The individual claimed to have been ushered into a “religious seminary” for new arrivals to the Islamic State in Iraq.

After basic training was completed, his platoon of 25 English- and French-speaking fighters was offered its first mission — to defend the former ISIS stronghold of Tikrit, the individual wrote.

The tale could possible be a tardy account of the Battle of Tikrit, when Iraqi forces won back the town from ISIS in early March. It could also be a complete fabrication meant to win the propaganda war, not to fill the history books. The author of the tale didn’t respond to repeated questions, making the story impossible to verify.