Terror Suspects Learned Jihad Behind Bars

The four men in custody for carrying out a terror plot to attack synagogues and shoot down military aircraft at Stewart Airport learned Islam while behind bars in a New York correctional institution. In fact, the men later attended the mosque where the prison chaplain preached.

Imam Salahuddin Muhammad is the spiritual leader of the Masjid Al-Ikhlas, the Newburgh mosque where the four terrorist wannabes met.

Muhammad also has worked as a prison chaplain at Fishkill Correctional Facility since 1985 -- where alleged Bronx terrorist James Cromitie was imprisoned in 1991.

Muhammad was recruited to work in the prison system by the controversial Warith Deen Umar, who was booted after he reportedly said Muslims "secretly admire" the attacks on the World Trade Center.

Muhammad converted to Islam when he was in prison, said Imam Talib Abdur-Rashid of the Mosque of Islamic Brotherhood in Harlem, who has known Muhammad for 20 years. Muhammad served 12 years for robbery, according to a 2003 report in The Wall Street Journal.

Muhammad, who also serves as a chaplain at Bard College, yesterday dismissed his connection to Umar, who was regarded as one of the most influential Muslim clerics in the vast state prison system.

"This brother has his own mind," Muhammad said. "We're not teaching hatred. I love this country."

This doesn't necessarily mean that Salahuddin Muhammad preached jihad, but it does raise troubling questions over what exactly he was teaching that got so mangled that these four considered jihad against the United States.

In fact, it's troubling that he didn't go out of his way to distance himself from the controversial claims and statements made by his mentor Umar, who was on the record as admiring 9/11 and the Islamic terrorists who carried out those attacks. He gave a non-answer answer, which deflects attention for those who aren't paying attention. Muhammad didn't say that he didn't agree with his mentor, but that he's not teaching hatred. In a way, Muhammad would be right - jihad isn't about hatred. It's about forcible submission to Islam. He could be preaching jihad and not think twice about the idea that jihad ends in bloodshed.

Meanwhile, the four men were arrested while carrying out what they thought would end up in mass casualty attacks. Some on the left (Alex Jones, who I will not link), and Talking Points Memo (which provides talking points to folks like Maureen Dowd) keep throwing out the spurious claims that these men were set up, but the fact is that these men sought jihad and came across a man who later turned out to be an informant who was working for the FBI and NYPD and he provided them with the materials they thought were bombs and surface to air missiles. They carried out the attacks with the intent. If these four hadn't come across this informant, they would have proceeded until they came across someone who did have the materials and technical know-how to pull off their plans.

The same people who complain now of a setup are the same people who complain when law enforcement disrupts terror plots before they reach this stage - that they're arrested while engaging in the conspiracy, but the actions to commit mass murder have not been carried out.

These would be the same people who would bray at the top of their lungs should a mass casualty attack not be thwarted by law enforcement because they missed the opportunity to stop the terrorists.

UPDATE:
Cromitie's mother, a devout Christian, told her son James to "get out of here"
when he informed her that he was converting to Islam. Also, one of the members of the terror cell had managed to buy a gun from a Bloods gang member in Brooklyn. Payen is described as schizophrenic and being off his meds; he's here illegally and the immigration judge had stayed his case pending medical evaluation.

UPDATE:
The Times has a profile of each of the four members of the terror cell. All four are career criminals, engaging in everything from drugs to assault. One may have been in the country illegally.