* Just in with thanks to Jeffrey Imm
“Our success is the greatest praise of the Lord”Â
* Not that this has anything to do with Islam…
AFP calls this turd a “militant”- and the 9/11 attacks “alleged”
Â
WASHINGTON (AFP) – Alleged September 11, 2001 attacks mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four co-defendants have indicated they will confess to terror charges in their trial before a USmilitary tribunal in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the judge said on Monday.
“The accused in this case had decided that they wished to withdraw all motions… and wished to enter pleas in what was termed as confessions in this case,” the judge, Army Colonel Stephen Henley, said shortly after the pre-trial proceedings began.
When asked by the judge if he was prepared to enter pleas Monday to all the charges should the commission allow the defendants to withdraw their motions, Mohammed said “Yes.”
“We don’t want to waste time,” Mohammed told the judge.
* Â 9/11 suspects ask to make ‘confessions’ at Gitmo
Here’s more from Bloomberg:
Sept. 11 Suspects Offer to Plead Guilty ‘in Full’Â
Â
By James Rowley
Dec. 8 (Bloomberg) — Self-described Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four co-defendants today offered in a Guantanamo Bay courtroom to plead guilty to charges that could lead to the death penalty.
The five reached agreement to “announce our confessions and plea in full,” according to a document read in court by Judge Stephen Henley, an Army colonel.
“I do not trust Americans,” Mohammed, who has previously said he wanted to be martyred, told the judge today. He claimed the existence of an “agreement between Bush and CIA who tortured me,” and the court, though he didn’t explain what he meant.
Military prosecutors are seeking the death penalty against the five alleged Sept. 11conspirators including Mohammed, who has said he organized the al-Qaeda attacks that killed almost 3,000 people in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania seven years ago. Relatives of five victims of the attacks sat in the gallery; it was the first time victims’ relatives were present in the courtroom with the terrorism defendants.
“Are you prepared to enter pleas to the charges against you today?” the judge asked Mohammed.
“Yes,” Mohammed responded.
The document read today in court was filed by all five defendants on Nov. 4 following a series of meetings among them.
“Our success is the greatest praise of the Lord,” the judge read from the document.
‘Without Any Pressure’
“All of these decisions are undertaken by us without any pressure or influence by Khalid Sheikh,” co-defendant Ali Abdul Aziz Ali told the judge. “What was said or will be said by Khalid Sheikh will be repeated by us, also.”
Mohammed and the others are among 250 being held at Guantanamo, a U.S. military prison camp in Cuba that has become the target of international criticism for jailing hundreds of suspected terrorists without charges. President-elect Barack Obama has pledged to close the prison, located in a remote patch of a U.S. Navy base on land leased from Cuba.
Henley asked military prosecutors to submit legal briefs on whether the commission can “accept a plea of guilty to a capital offense.”
Navy Commander Suzanne Lachelier objected to including her client, Ramzi Binalshibh, a nephew of Mohammed, in the filing of the Nov. 4 document. She said he had “been permitted to go to this meeting” and others “without notice to me.”
The court has reserved decision on Binalshibh’s request to dismiss his lawyer pending a hearing on the results of a psychiatric examination of Binalshibh.
Lawyer Denounced
Binalshibh denounced his lawyer in court, saying, “She is a person who is not cooperative and she lies.”
Defense lawyers have alleged that Binalshibh and defendant Mustafa al Hawsawi were intimidated by Mohammed to waive their right to legal representation.
The court has also reserved decision on al Hawsawi’s request to dismiss his military lawyer, Army Major Jon Jackson. Today, the judge granted Jackson’s request for a psychiatric examination to determine his client’s mental capacity to plead guilty. The judge said Jackson had described concerns about his client’s mental state in a secret court filing.
Al Hawsawi told the judge he decided to plead guilty “with all my complete mental capacity and voluntarily.”
The relatives in the gallery were chosen at random from 115 family members of Sept. 11 victims who applied for permission to travel to Guantanamo to witness the proceedings.
Obama has criticized the military commissions, saying the Guantanamo detainees should be tried either in federal court or before a military court-martial. Seventeen prisoners face war- crimes charges and Pentagon officials say as many as 80 at Guantanamo may be charged.
To contact the reporter on this story: James Rowley in Guantanamo Bay atjarowley@bloomberg.net
Gitmo Jihad: The Show Begins…
By Walid Phares
FOX News Contributor/Terror Analyst
Al Qaeda’s great moment for propaganda has arrived, just as I predicted it would when I wrote about this in June. The Guantanamo trials will provide leading figures in the 9/11 massacre their “moment” to deliver a blow to America’s psyche, image and legal system.
Â
A courtoom drawing shows Khalid Sheikh Mohammed,center, attending a pre-trial session at Guantanamo (AP)
As predicted, almost to the letter in my analysis in June, the men charged with plotting the September 11 attacks have declared their readiness to make confessions. According to FOX News and the Associated Press the military judge assigned to their war crimes trial at Guantanamo Bay read aloud a letter in which the five co-defendants said they request an immediate hearing session “to announce our confessions.” The AP report added that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (aka KSM) has already told interrogators he was the mastermind of the attacks. “Now he’s telling the judge that he and the others want to make confessions at the trial.” The judge at the pre-trial hearing, Army Col. Stephen Henley, is asking each defendant if they are prepared to enter a plea. Three have agreed to do so.
So, is there an Al Qaeda plan being put into motion on the inside? Most likely there is as our knowledge of Al Qaeda training instructions has shown. –Both the government and media of the United States are ill-prepared for this type of jihadi propaganda warfare. Seven years after the beginning of the so-called “War on Terror,” the enemy’s ideology, strategies and methods still haven’t been officially identified. It is like using a Word War I mind set to fight World War II terror strategies.
The “confessions” turned declaration of victory will be picked up by Al Qaeda and other jihadi groups and transformed into vital material for propaganda: videos, audio and texts.
Here is what the jihadists, both on the inside and the outside of the Guantanamo detention center are planning for:
First, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his comrades will use the so-called confessions deal to build a psychological environment for a martyrdom case: “istishaad.” They aren’t interested in saving their lives (at first, although they think they could) but in providing a maximum damage to their enemy through the tribunal proceedings. They will claim the court is not legitimate, the entire Guantanamo process as illegal and that they are ready to die as Jihadis in the path to Allah. Their first target is to grant themselves, in the eyes of millions of militants around the world the status of “Shuhada,” martyrs, even though they could survive it.
The “confessions” turned declaration of victory will be picked up by Al Qaeda and other jihadi groups and transformed into vital material for propaganda: videos, audio and texts. The “show” inside court will be used for indoctrination purpose around the world. A myth will be set in motion and emotional reactions to the “story” will be mutated into future revenge operations.
From there on, leave it to the architects of jihadi propaganda: statements made by the defendants will be used by operatives online, in the chat rooms but also on Al Jazeera (by callers and guests), and in other medium to widen the radicalization of youth in the Arab and Muslim world and within the West as well. An Al Qaeda “control room” will use the feed from the Guantanamo trials to produce a victory in their war of ideas against democracies. The fate of the 9/11 detainees isn’t the issue to Al Qaeda. By pledging loyalty to the “mission” through the so-called “confessions” or statements they have already sacrificed themselves ideologically. What KSM and his comrades are offering to their “brothers” around the world is an unbeatable series of images, footage and audio — pure gold for Al Qaeda propagandists and ideologues.
Ironically, during this time of transition between the two administrations in both the Bush and Obama teams may find they overlook the direct goals of Al Qaeda’s plan. As national security teams meet and wrestle over future options in the War on Terror (will some possibly end up just calling it a “war”?) the other side is waging its own war methodically, relentlessly and unstoppably. Every inch of room to maneuver is used to the maximum to weaken the enemy, even from within the walls of the detention centers. And that is only at Guantanamo that the defendants are openly admitting their responsibilities in spreading terror. Wait until the processing of jihadists hits our U.S. courts here on the mainland. What we see now is just the beginning.
Dr. Walid Phares is Director of the Future Terrorism Project at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies
Drown them all in pig piss and bury them in pig poop and be done with them. They’ve lived far too long too well at taxpayer expense.