generalspeaking

"No Comment To Make"

"This investigation launched in February 2011. It targeted a Canadian citizen of Lebanese origin who exported parts of assault weapons, which they call an AR-15. Any criminal act that poses a potential threat to national security is dealt with very seriously by all law enforcement agencies including our national security enforcement team." Corporal Luc Thibault RCMP "C" Division, Montreal

Another Diab heard from, another Lebanese-born struggling to defend the reputation of Muslims against the unfounded accusations of the West. In Hassan Diab's case, the accusation by France that he was involved in the rue Copernicus Synagogue bombing that killed innocent French civilian passersby rather than his intended target, innocent French Jews who were praying to God; presumably the same Spirit that Muslims venerate, under their own nomenclature.

He is innocent, he and his supporters claim, of all manufactured charges brought unfairly against him, and is resisting the request by the Government of France that Canada extradite him to face trial on those very charges. He has no desire to clear his name in France, to prove that the evidence brought against him is insubstantial and cannot be substantiated. And, he insists, his name is a most common one in Lebanon.

He has proved his point in the instance of the name, for here is yet another Diab, this one with the given name of Mouna, a young woman living in Montreal who has been active in her community presenting Muslims as peace-loving and law-abiding citizens of Canada. An investigation launched in February of 2011 through the Integrated National Security Enforcement Team in Montreal led to Ms. Diab's arrest by the RCMP at Montreal's Trudeau Airport in May.

She had prohibited items in her luggage. Parts for the assemblage of an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle. Other parts had already been shipped by air to a destination in Lebanon. Why send weapons to Lebanon? Lebanon is weighted down with weapons. Lebanon has more weapons-grade metal on its soil than the weight of its citizens combined. Not merely leftovers from its civil war, but all that has been smuggled/imported into the country despite the UN Resolution on Lebanon.

"No person in Canada and no Canadian outside Canada shall knowingly export, sell, supply or ship, directly or indirectly, arms and related material, wherever situated, to any person in Lebanon." Section 3 of the Canadian Regulations Implementing the UN Resolution on Lebanon

Ms. Diab is a busy young woman, very involved in her community. She was listed as 2007 vice-president of the association des jeunes libanais musulmans in Montreal. This is a website linked to the sites of a few Shiite clerics; notably Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Supreme Leader of the Islamist Republic of Iran, patron of Lebanon's Hezbollah.

As well as another Iranian whose claim to fame is his contention the West is involved in an effort to "wipe out" Muslim culture. Sensibly, Iran plans to strike before it is struck, and has targeted the symbol of Western culture in the Middle East, warning time over time, even within the United Nations, that it is prepared to "wipe out" the State of Israel.

Another link is to a now-deceased Lebanese cleric's website, where can be found the legend that it is "obligatory to wage war" against Israel. Any attempts, let alone thoughts, of making peace with Israel are "not permissible", and it is severely incumbent upon Muslims in "occupied land" to provide "material or moral support" to fighters. And obviously, Mouna Diab, as an obedient and devout Muslim is prepared to do just that.

This is an association of young 'activist' Muslims, which appeared among those signing a statement in 2006 for the purpose of denouncing Prime Minister Stephen Harper's declared position on the legitimacy of Israel's right to defend itself against the violence against its land and its people, emanating from Lebanon through the auspices of Hezbollah, funded by Syria and Iran as their non-state military proxy.

A member of the executive committee at the Lebanese Islamic Centre in Montreal, a venue where Ms. Diab was involved in the youth association located there, advised that the centre has never condoned breaking the law. Furthermore, said Ali Chibli, he found it puzzling, the nature of the charge against Ms. Diab.

"In Lebanon, they don't need people to ship them [gun] parts from here. ...In Lebanon, it's easy to get weapons. It's easy to get rifles. It's easy to get whatever you want."

The conundrum being, on her journey to her homeland of Lebanon, what was this Canadian citizen planning, whom was she meeting, where are her loyalties, and why is she a citizen of Canada, not content to live in Lebanon where it is far more congenial to live for those committed to the messages cited and linked at the website for des jeunes libanais musulmans?

Labels: Canada, Middle East, Misadventure, Political Realities

posted by Pieface @ Monday, October 24, 2011