Holland Tunnel Case: Fear Mongering Headline
I realize that reporters may not get to choose the headlines for their articles, but whoever wrote the AP headline "Suspect in Tunnel Plot Said to Vist U.S." should be fired. Not because it's untrue, but because it's misleading. The headline panders to the fear-mongers who want us to believe that New Yorkers were in imminent danger from those arrested in the Holland Tunnel case. As I wrote yesterday, the New York Times and other media outlets have reported this was another aspirational plot in the gestation phase.
The headline to the AP article conveys fear by suggesting that the plot had advanced to a threatening stage because the main suspect had visited the U.S. But the article says:
In the U.S., a federal law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing, said Hammoud had visited the United States at least once - a trip to California six years ago. Authorities are still trying to trace Hammoud's steps during that trip but say they have no record of him going to New York.
The official said Hammoud had a legitimate visa for a brief stay, and was believed to have been visiting either family or friends. The visit occurred long before authorities say the tunnel plot began to unfold.
In other case related news, Lebanon, which arrested Assem Hammoud in April and continues to hold him, boasts he has confessed during his interrogation. As to his arrest:
"We received information from the FBI in April about an attempt to plot a terror act in New York City through Internet communications in Lebanon," Fatfat said in the interview Saturday. "Based on this information, security forces acted and arrested Mr. Assem Hammoud."
There it is again, another way for the Administration to convince Americans that warrantless spying on Internet communications is essential to the war on terror.
As to his confession,
Lebanese security officials told The Associated Press that they obtained "important information" from Hammoud's computer and CDs seized from his office at the Lebanese International University, where he taught economics.
"This information helped the investigators make Hammoud confess to his role in plotting a terror act in America," one Lebanese official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case.
Was it the information on the computer that helped investigators "make him confess" or was it their other tactics?
The suspect's family denied that he had any al-Qaida links. His mother, Nabila Qotob, said Hammoud was an outdoorsy person who drank alcohol, had girlfriends and bore none of the hallmarks of an Islamic extremist.
Hammoud studied at Concordia University in Montreal for seven years beginning in 1995, university spokeswoman Chris Mota said Sunday. He graduated with a bachelor's degree in commerce in 2002.
Update: Blake Fleetwood at Huffpo has more in The Playboy Professor.
When asked whether Hammoud was tortured, acting Interior Minister, Ahmad Fatfat said, "The subject isn't in my hands anymore, but in the hands of the judiciary," according to the Beirut Daily Star.
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