April 18, 2007, - 12:23 pm

Now That He’s Dead: Two More of Saddam’s “American” Spies Get Busted

By
Last week, I told you about , a Chicago O’Hare Airport gate agent and U.S. citizen, who was also part of an Iraqi terror cell, working for Saddam Hussein. He was convicted on Monday and could be convicted to up to 40 years in prison.
His name was in Iraqi government documents that U.S. forces discovered in 2003.
Yesterday, an indictment was unsealed for two Detroit-area men, Ghazi Al-Awadi, a Muslim, and Najib Shemami, a Chaldean (Iraqi Catholic), who were arrested and arraigned on also working as agents of Saddam. One of the men even murdered his son-in-law for working for an anti-Saddam group. He pleaded to manslaughter and served only six years in Michigan prisons. And you–the American taxpayer–are now paying for his federal public defender.


“American” Spies for Iraq Ghazi Al-Awadi & Najib Shemami

Surprise, surprise–both men are U.S. citizens, too. Unfortunately, there are men who are well-known former spies of Saddam, who have gone untouched and unpunished by pan-Islamist
Men, like liberal Democrat , made over $70 million in doing business with Saddam in violation of the U.S. embargo on Saddam’s Iraq. He goes untouched, and I regularly see him in suburban Detroit with . He also gave $400,000 to former U.N. Weapons Inspector Scott Ritter to produce a pro-Saddam documentary, and contributed thousands to pro-Saddam Democrats and Republicans.
On the Republican side, there is Assad Kalasho, who helped Saddam broadcast on satellite airwaves to America, in violation of U.S. law, and made a hefty profit off of it. He gave thousands to Republican U.S. Congressman Joe Knollenberg, Hezbollah’s 2nd favorite Republican in Congress. Near my home, Kalasho, the free multi-millionaire owns a club, “The Palace.” Yes, Saddam even his a palace in America, months after his death.
More details from the Detroit Free Press:

Two metro Detroit men have been charged with spying for Saddam Hussein’s intelligence service, supplying the executed dictator’s regime with information about its enemies in the United States, according to federal court documents unsealed Tuesday.
Ghazi Al-Awadi, 78, of Dearborn allegedly told the Iraqi Intelligence Service in 1997 that he killed his son-in-law because the man belonged to an anti-Hussein political party, court documents said.
Najib Shemami, 59, of Sterling Heights allegedly provided Iraqi intelligence with information about Iraqi expatriates who might be called upon to guide U.S. troops during the invasion of Iraq and potential political candidates for the new government. . . .
Metro Detroit Iraqis have long complained they were being spied upon.
Both men are charged with conspiring to act as agents of a foreign government without the approval of the attorney general, and acting as an agent for a foreign government. Shemami also is charged with violating the U.S. International Emergency Powers Act and making false statements to the FBI.
The most serious charge against Shemami, violating the emergency powers act, carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. The most serious charge against Al-Awadi, acting as a foreign agent, carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Donald Scheer freed both men on $10,000 bonds following brief appearances Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Detroit. He ordered them to surrender their passports and confined their travel to southeast Michigan.
Both men are U.S. citizens. Shemami is married, has nine children, has lived in the United States for about 40 years and is disabled, Mateo said.
Al-Awadi, who lives alone in an apartment and appeared frail and hard of hearing during Tuesday’s court hearing, has been in the United States since 1974, court records said. He has seven children and lives on Social Security.
In 1996, he was paroled from the Michigan Department of Corrections after serving six years of a 5- to 15-year sentence for manslaughter in the stabbing of his son-in-law, Imad Muttar, in Dearborn.
The captured documents said Al-Awadi, code named Ghassan, met with Iraqi officials in 1997, offered to cooperate and said he had killed his son-in-law for belonging to the Al-Da’wa Party in the United States.
The documents said he provided information about a retired Iraqi physician who was planning to flee to the United States and his nephew, a major general in Iraq, who allegedly was put under surveillance as a result of Al-Awadi’s information.
When the FBI interviewed him in 2006, he denied working as an Iraqi agent, court documents said, adding that he had gone overseas in 1997, 2001 and 2002 to visit family members.

So when will Shakir Alkhafaji and Assad Kalasho get their just rewards? . . .
Don’t hold your breath.




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3 Responses

5 bombings kill at least 147 across Baghdad
By Edmund Sanders, Times Staff Writer
9:31 AM PDT, April 18, 2007
Five car bombs tore through Iraq’s capital today, killing at least 147 people and injuring more than 208 in the deadliest day of violence in the city since U.S. and Iraqi forces launched a much publicized security crackdown two months ago.
The attacks targeted mostly Shiite neighborhoods, heightening fears that sectarian violence, which had begun to decline in recent weeks, would resume.
The bloodiest of the attacks killed 115 people in the beleaguered Sadriya district, which was still recovering from a car bomb blast last month that killed about 130 in a busy marketplace.
Victims of today’s late afternoon attack included construction workers repairing damage from last month’s bombing, and rush- hour commuters at a bus depot, waiting for rides home.
Witnesses reported seeing a minibus explode, leaving a 15-foot crater in the road and setting ablaze dozens of buses and taxis. Street vendors dumped their fruits and vegetables to help evacuate victims in wooden carts, witnesses said.
“It was really chaos,” said Abu-Hussam, 51, who owns a paint shop nearby. “People are coming here to look for their loved ones.”
Heavy afternoon traffic hindered rescue efforts and heightened the death toll, police said. Local hospitals were inundated with bodies.
In Sadr City, a suicide car bomber detonated a bomb at the eastern gateway to the Baghdad slum, trying to strike an army checkpoint. At least 16 were killed, perhaps as many as 30, according to preliminary reports from police and government officials.
Sadr City, the home turf of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada Sadr, has been a focal point of the U.S.-Iraqi security campaign, which began Feb. 13. The dangerous district, largely controlled by Sadr militiamen, has been a frequent target of Sunni-led insurgent attacks.
“I saw vehicles burning and scattered bodies here and there,” said Abu Zahraa, 35, a security worker at Imam Ali hospital who rushed to the scene. “It’s an unbelievable scene. Indescribable.”
In the past, Sadr militia have responded by retaliating with assassinations and armed attacks on Sunni neighborhoods. The security crackdown aimed to put a stop to the sectarian violence.
Other car bombs struck the Karada district, killing 10 and wounding 13, and Mahmodiya, killing four Iraqi soldiers.
U.S. officials today insisted that the security crackdown was working, despite the recent surge in attacks. Last week, insurgents blew up a symbolic Baghdad bridge and a suicide bomber infiltrated tight Green Zone security to detonate explosives inside Parliament’s cafeteria, killing one lawmaker.
“We have seen both inspiring progress and too much evidence that we still face many grave challenges,” said Maj. Gen. William B. Caldwell IV, the chief U.S. military spokesman in Iraq. We’ve always said that security in Baghdad will not be easy (Insurgents) showed that as Iraq builds, they will try and destroy.”
edmund.sanders@latimes.com

the_don on April 18, 2007 at 1:36 pm

These guys need to be left in a room full of 9/11 victim’s family. Let them get what they deserve.

M.C. on May 7, 2011 at 1:08 pm

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