Five Radical Islamists Convicted

In Camden, NJ, yesterday, a jury convicted the remaining five defendants in the Fort Dix Six plot. Mohamad Ibrahim Shnewer, Dritan Duka, Shain Duka, Eljvir Duka, and Serdar Tatar were found guilty on charges they plotted to kill members of the U.S. military, Acting United States Attorney Ralph J. Marra, Jr. announced. The five face sentencing of any number of years up to life in prison. A sixth co-defendant, Agron Abdullahu, was previsouly sentenced to 20 months after pleading guilty last year to charges that he aided and abetted the Duka brothers’ illegal possession of weapons.

On May 10, 2007, three days after the six were arrested, Mark Levin pointed out that their defense lawyers and the Leftist media were already implying the Fort Dix Six had been led into the plot by the FBI:

Indeed, the trial defense asserted there would have been no conspiracy without entrapment by two federal informants. Obviously, the jury did not buy their story. After the trial, Prosecutor William Fitzpatrick said, “The FBI investigates crime on the front end. They don’t want to have to do it on the back end.”

This morning, the Wall Street Journal weighed in:

The jury’s verdict is notable because media coverage of the plotters’ arrest and trial traveled a familiar arc: After a round of stories noting that a terrorist plot had been rolled up, the media followed up with skepticism and suggestions that the suspects were small-timers or just messing around. The word even went out that, in effect, the government’s man on the inside had put them up to it. The implication, as with the Lackawanna Six and Jose Padilla, is always the same: The Bush Administration was advertising phantom threats to justify the trampling of civil liberties and to create a “climate of fear.”

Lest we forget, the Fort Dix plotters were finally arrested last year after they moved to buy AK-47s and fully automatic M-16s — not exactly the stuff of innocent imaginings and idle chatter. Every plotter is an amateur until he pulls off a spectacular attack. This has created a permanent PR problem for the fight against domestic terror plots: If you move too soon, the conventional wisdom comes to doubt that anything serious was averted. But of course, waiting too long means running the risk of another attack on American soil, something we have avoided since 9/11.

One final point. Who can forget the shortcomings of Keith Olbermann, last year (or ever), when he had this to say:

The ultimate premise of the war in Iraq and the ultimate premise, certainly, of the Republican presidential campaign ahead, counterterrorism. The FBI claims it has broken up a plot to attack Fort Dix in New Jersey. The flaw, though, in the breathless reporting of the purported terror cell, the bureau infiltrated the six-person group after its members took video of themselves practicing with assault weapons, brought the tape to a photo store, and had it transferred to a DVD.

The details of the supposed plot don’t seem to hold together that well either, though that did not stop extensive and entirely credulous coverage on TV, the Internet, in print today. The men supposedly had plans to gain access to the base disguised as pizza delivery guys, then cut the power somehow, they, quote, “hit four, five, or six Humvees and light the whole place, and retreat without any losses.” And take the tape of yourselves practicing and have it copied at PhotoMat. In other words, the FBI has arrested six morons.

Yesterday, Johnny Dollar at OlbermannWatch.com predicted that Keithy will come up short again:

If Olbermoronn reports this news, it reveals his previous inane banter for the buffoonery that it is. Does he spike the story and pretend the convictions never happened? Or twist it around and claim the innocent “morons” are political prisoners and should be released? Or does he take the courageous step of not even showing up for work today? Perhaps he will admit he was wrong and … strike that, ain’t gonna happen … It’s our Monday night thread, open early so that we can all enjoy the anticipation of tonight’s inevitable Great Moment in Olbypocrisy.

Conspiring to murder our troops, on our soil, is a federal crime, the opinion of a moron sportscaster posing as a journalist for MSNBC notwithstanding.

While the Fort Dix Six are Muslims, it only proves that Islamic radicals continue to view America as a battleground for their “Holy” war.