# Omar Khadr, the convicted terrorist is now back in Canada in Millhaven pen



## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

Well, we finally got our home grown former terrorist back from Guantanamo.
He has served a few years there after confessing to his crimes. He is currently
in Millhaven penitentiary (Kingston max security pen), where he will remain until his parole (release?) hearing in May 2013.

His lawyers are not happy with the "gov'ts vilification" of him and all the controversy surrounding him now after all these
years. The Canadian parole review board will hold a hearing next year to determine if he is rehabilated enough to be released
back into the Canadian public life. 

The father (who supported Al-Queda in the late 90s, worked in Ottawa at Bell Northern Research
for a while. He left Canada to head a fund raising agency in Pakistan to funnel funds to (alleged) terrorist groups.
The eldest son (trained in Afghanistan in Al-Queda also died there during a fire fight with UN Forces. 

*Here's what the mother has to say about his transfer to Canada..*

*<excerpt from the Toronto Star>*
_Standing at the door of her Scarborough apartment Sunday morning, Elsamnah criticized Canadian media for its portrayal of her son and the lack of “truth” written about him and her late husband, Ahmed Said Khadr, who was killed by Pakistani forces in 2003.

“*If this is what the Canadians want to know, that people can be killed and not stand up, stand up and be angry and hurt when you’re being attacked, or abused or bullied.

“We don’t feel like we’re being treated fairly*,” Elsamnah said before her daughter Zaynab Ahmed Khadr, slammed the door._


In Oct. 2010, Khadr pleaded guilty to five war crimes, including murder. Khadr received an eight-year sentence in return for his guilty plea and a diplomatic note that said Ottawa would “favourably” consider his transfer to a Canadian prison after one more year in Guantanamo.

*The Toronto-born Khadr was Guantanamo’s youngest prisoner and its last western detainee.*
*<end of Toronto Star article>*


Who was being attacked? The young Khadr in Afghanistan..where he shouldn't have been in the first place?
He was born in Toronto and therefore a Canadian citizen with a Canadian passport (presumption here),
what was he doing with the insurgents throwing grenades at US forces?

Ok CMF friends, something is wrong here with this kind of family attitude! The mother is trying to say he is not
a terrorist, and shouldn't be painted with a "terrorist brush"....that he was only trying to stand up from being killed
and defend himself when being attacked by...

So IMO, here are some fast facts about them.

1 They immigrate as a family from the middle east (Afghanistan) to Canada.
2. Canada accepted them as a refugee family
3. The Khadr family was given social assistance for a long time, until the father found suitable work
4. The family then moved to Toronto where Omar was born.
after that..it's a blur on what they were up to...until the father moved to Pakistan and the eldest son followed him. 

So, if you are born in Canada, considered an Canadian citizen with all the rights given to you by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms,
why on earth would you jeopardize these freedoms we cherish by going to Afghanistan and joining other insurgents in the fight against
US and UN forces (which Canada was part of)?
Doesn't this make you an enemy combantant, going against the principles of Canadian citizenship? 
Even if you were a child of 15, does this give you the right to throw a grenade at a US medic?
Whie it may be a sad sequence of events that got the young Khadr in that circumstance, by his actions..he fatally
wounded a US soldier, he was caught, imprisoned and confessed to his crimes.

Now "Mother Khadr" why do you feel that "we are being untreated fairly"?


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## Nemo2 (Mar 1, 2012)

Imagine how much simpler things would have been if he had just been allowed to quietly bleed out.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

I'm not sure to what extent you can hold a 15 year old child responsible for his actions, especially with parents like his.

Khadr wasn't just imprisoned. He was held in an extrajudicial gulag indefinitely. I would call that a violation of his right to due process.


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## Nemo2 (Mar 1, 2012)

carverman said:


> So IMO, here are some fast facts about them.
> 
> They immigrate as a family from the middle east (Afghanistan) to Canada.


Incorrect. The father was Egyptian, the mother is Palestinian - no ethnic ties to Afghanistan whatsoever.


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## sags (May 15, 2010)

It is never black and white.

Khadr was a Canadian citizen fighting for what many perceive as the wrong side in Afghanistan.

On the other hand, many in that region of the world view the US and UN forces as an invading army.

Khadr confessed to the crimes, but the US was using torture methods to extract confessions. The general consensus is that people will confess to anything under those circumstances.

There has been some question as to the accuracy of the charges against him, witness accounts, and the lack of due process he experienced.

That is not to excuse anyone's behavour........but each side claims they are on the side of righteousness. Both sides claim their soldiers as "victims" and the other side as "terrorists".

If Canadians have a wide range of opinions on one case, like Khadr's, how do we play the role of mediator with the multitude of huge problems in that region of the world?

The Muslim world will decide their own destiny.

All the lives lost in Afghanistan...... and can anyone claim that anything has changed?


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## Nemo2 (Mar 1, 2012)

The fact is, as a Canadian citizen Khadr committed high treason by taking up arms against soldiers of a country with whom Canada is/was allied during hostilities.


Treason:


> b) levies war against Canada or does any act preparatory thereto; or
> 
> (c) assists an enemy at war with Canada, or any armed forces against whom Canadian Forces are engaged in hostilities, whether or not a state of war exists between Canada and the country whose forces they are.


William Joyce, known as "Lord Haw Haw" during WWII, broadcast Nazi propaganda......(he didn't fight, he never shot anyone)........he was executed by the British after the war.

So the fact that Khadr was even _in_ Afghanistan and shooting/throwing grenades/making IEDs to be used against allied troops, should be enough to hang him.


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## Spudd (Oct 11, 2011)

No hangings here. The penalty for high treason is life imprisonment.


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

Nemo2 said:


> The fact is, as a Canadian citizen Khadr committed high treason by taking up arms against soldiers of a country with whom Canada is/was allied during hostilities.


No question, but you won't convince everyone that this 'child' was no victim, though one can't deny the brainwashing suffered at the hands of just about every member of that radical family. 

And about your comment that the Khadrs had no ethnic ties to Afghanistan, though true, they felt strong ties for other reasons, hence the family lived in Afghanistan in the 80's as per link below [not updated].

http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/khadr/khadrfamily.html


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## Nemo2 (Mar 1, 2012)

Toronto.gal said:


> And about your comment that the Khadrs had no ethnic ties to Afghanistan, though true, they felt strong ties for other reasons, hence the family lived in Afghanistan in the 80's as per link below [not updated].
> 
> http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/khadr/khadrfamily.html


"Lived" in Afghanistan, or used it as an al Qaeda terrorist base? Did the Khadrs apply for Afghan citizenship?

(I've been to Africa a number of times; I feel "strong ties"......but I'm not an African.)


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

Nemo2 said:


> (I've been to Africa a number of times; I feel "strong ties"......but I'm not an African.)


Yabbut, what were you doing there?! That would answer the question about your motives, no? I've been to Machu Picchu & other places several times, but also never felt Peruvian & never applied for citizenship there either. :tongue-new: 

According to many reports, after leaving Canada & moving all over the ME region, the patriarch figure in the Khadr family, had become 'Disappointed to find Western influences in Bahrain', so not sure why the family returned here [I guess we do know].

'Ahmed became captivated by the Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan and began to feel guilty about his relative wealth and comfort, compared to the Muslim widows and orphans in Afghanistan. Through 1983 and 1984, the family remained in Bahrain while the children were in school, and during the summer holidays Ahmed would travel to Pakistan while his wife took the three children back home to Scarborough, Canada where they lived with her parents. Ignoring the arguments of Azzam Tamimi, an Islamic academic living in Bahrain at the time, Ahmed insisted that he had no intentions of helping to fight the Soviets, only of helping the victims of the invasion.'

*A timeline*
http://news.nationalpost.com/2010/10/26/the-khadr-family-a-timeline/

Great humanitarians, living in Osama bin Laden's compound and training in his terrorist camps and all, wouldn't you agree? And now the family at long last is reunited in Canada, what a happy ending for all. :rolleyes2:


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## Nemo2 (Mar 1, 2012)

Toronto.gal said:


> I've been to Machu Picchu & other places several times


 OMG, don't tell me you're going to say you were with _Sendero Luminoso_? :rolleyes2:



Toronto.gal said:


> Great humanitarians, living in Osama bin Laden's compound and training in his terrorist camps and all, wouldn't you agree? And now the family at long last is reunited in Canada, what a happy ending for all. :rolleyes2:


"Ah", says he, with a fake Irish accent, "And aren't you bringing a tear to me eye". :tongue-new:


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

Nemo2 said:


> OMG, don't tell me you're going to say you were with _Sendero Luminoso_?


Pffft, you had to blow my cover, didn't you? :02.47-tranquillity:


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## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

Nemo2 said:


> Incorrect. The father was Egyptian, the mother is Palestinian - no ethnic ties to Afghanistan whatsoever.


Yes, you are right there..sorry about my error this morning.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

Whether he's guilty of the crimes he committed or not, he had a right to due process. We failed in that. We allowed him to be held without charge, without access to a lawyer. We allowed him to be tortured. Whatever he did, that is our failing as a country.

He was convicted of murdering an American medic. The trial was in a kangaroo court. His confession was probably coerced: he was well aware he was going to stay in extrajudicial hell unless he confessed. 

My point isn't that I like the guy. I have empathy for him. He was raised by family with vile beliefs. He was a child soldier. He apparently killed an American soldier. He had a right to due process. He probably should have been treated as a child soldier. Regardless, he has been convicted and will serve the remainder of his time in Canada, and then be released (we are a nation of laws, right?). 

To all the people lacking in empathy, do you think if you or your loved ones had been put into his situation, that your life would have turned out differently?


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## carverman (Nov 8, 2010)

Toronto.gal said:


> No question, but you won't convince everyone that this 'child' was no victim, though one can't deny the brainwashing suffered at the hands of just about every member of that radical family.
> 
> And about your comment that the Khadrs had no ethnic ties to Afghanistan, though true, they felt strong ties for other reasons, hence the family lived in Afghanistan in the 80's as per link below [not updated].



Do we really know much about the history of the parents (mother Palestinian) and father Egyptian what they were up to before they came to Canada? Obviously their history of the past 25 years indicates they were not just a immigrant family wanting to start
a new life in Canada and live as quietly as possible. Why should we show them any sympathy? What have they done for Canada
besides use the free medical and social assistance (mother)?

I read from wiki that the father ( Ahmed) met the mother in Ottawa, during the time he found employment as a software engineera for BNR. This appears to have taken place before they moved to Scarborough.

_After a few months in Montreal, Khadr moved to Toronto, before being accepted at the University of Ottawa to study Computer Programming. It was in Ottawa that he met Qasem Mahmud, the founder of Camp Al-Mu-Mee-Neen in Creemore, Ontario. Anxious to settle down and begin a family, the secular 29-year old volunteered to help at the camp. There he met Maha el-Samnah, who was impressed by his calmness and thought he was a good listener. Mahmud later described their meeting as "love at first sight".[17]_
There is no doubt that there is at least some evidence that the father and at least 2 of the older sons in the Kahdr family may have been linked to Al-Queda along with the father.

_*In January 2001, Khadr's name was added to a United Nations list of individuals who supported terrorism associated with Bin Laden.[66]*_

The full and rather "convoluted story on the Kahdrs...typical Canadian immigrant family?...NOT!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahmed_Khadr

BTW..here is another "infamous" Egyptian terrorist who lived in other countries (to "study") before he went off to Islamic Heaven with the 18? virgins.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohamed_Atta


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