A Follow Up to
 The Holy Land Foundation Trial

(The Not-Even-Trying-to-be-Politically-Correct Version)

By Donna Diorio, October 31, 2007

The following is a short report on the reading of the verdict in the Holy Land Foundation trial.  I've also included a briefing on the facts of the case, many that have come to light in the week since the verdict.  These dots are not likely to be connected and forwarded by major media coverage which did not come out for the trial, made a last minute appearance at the verdict reading and has already let this story begin to fade without bringing it into clear focus for the public. 

I am not one who supports a scatter gun approach to opposing Islam in the United States and do not forward information that simply 'bad mouths' Muslims to my mailing lists.  Those who are really interested in getting to the truth of the matter have to get to the bottom with fact finders who are soft-peddling the threat, nor are those who don't distinguish between extremists and non-extremist Muslims.  Neither of these polarized positions in the public debate about Islam in America has done due diligence.    

We must choose our battles by educating ourselves on those who are working in darkness with evil agendas.  If we don't move beyond the two polarized positions above--the one that merely sees American Muslims as victims and the other that sees all of them as evil enemies, then we will continue to cancel out any effective insight into dealing with radical Islam that counter terror forces in our country are trying to awaken us to.

The U.S. public has to learn who the Islamist enemies in America are, to back the efforts of those who are sounding the alarm and moving to keep us safe from them.   We don't have to re-invent the wheel; we just have to do due diligence in investigating the evidence--much of which was laid out in the Holy Land Foundation trial. Counterterrorism experts are the frontline in the information war with radical Islamic terrorism in the U.S. and in Israel.  They are breaking it down into bite sized chucks for the media and the public to digest.  It is sheer foolishness to ignore what they are bringing forth.   

An Eyewitness to the Courthouse Scene
October 22, 2007  in the Holy Land Foundation Trial

First of all I would like to describe the scene for you at the court house on Monday.  Only the immediate family and limited media were allowed inside the court room.  The 16^th floor overflow room was strictly for media.  The court sent everyone to the Cafe on the 6^th floor with no media feed.  But when we went in with a couple from the Texas Jewish Post we saw that it was not going to be the best place for us to wait for the verdict. There were at least 100 to 150 Muslim HLF supporters gathered in the Cafe. 

We ended up waiting out the verdict in the jury selection room on the lobby level where the media was setting up for potential interviews.  No one but media was allowed on the lobby level, though we were given special permission since the Muslim-packed Cafe was out of the question for us.  While in the jury selection room we began to get the first whispers from the media camp that the verdicts had come.  We heard the verdicts were mostly acquittals mixed with "no decisions." 

Little by little the media area began to fill up with some of the higher profile HLF Muslim associates, like Nihad Awad of CAIR, an un-indicted co-conspirator and Mahdi Bray, Muslim American Society, as well as locals like Muslim Legal Fund president Khalil Meek, and Dallel Mohmed whose KinderUSA 'charity' was started as a replacement within a couple of months of the Holy Land Foundation closure.  [Ms. Mohmed was arrested in Israel in 2002 with another KinderUSA co-founder on suspicion of transferring funds to suicide bombers. Not charged by the Israelis, Ms. Mohmed is nevertheless barred from re-entering Israel.]

Clearly the HLF supporters filtering down into the lobby were celebrating, feeling they had won. It was very difficult for me, even when one of the reporters clarified the situation.  The judge had polled each juror individually and finding some in disagreement with the verdict, sent the jury back into further deliberations.  

It was news that sparked the tiniest glimmer of hope, but frankly in the moment that glimmer was overwhelmingly overshadowed by the gloating, and almost jubilant crowd of HLF supporters already giving comments to the media.  Confidence was high among the supporters that none of the defendants would be going to jail. 

We decided not to stick around for the growing party atmosphere among the HLF crowd. On the drive home we could barely even talk wondering what this devastating setback meant.

By the time we made the 20 minute drive home, I had received an email from the court that gave the official communication that Judge Fish had declared a mistrial.   A mistrial meant the whole lot of them could be re-tried.  We were not doomed after all to the consequences of failing to convict--of leaving the welcome mat out for Islamic terror groups to operate here. 

Those are the simple ramifications of the failure to get convictions, so rather than the worst possible news--acquittals--a mistrial meant that there was another shot at getting convictions.  Mourning turned to great joy and renewed hope that this wasn't over with yet.  I was amazed how good a mistrial looked to me at that point!  It may be an uphill climb to retry the case but at least it wasn't over.  The government must be encouraged to go forward to retry.  It cannot be seriously considered to let it go.

The newspapers and broadcast media are painting this as a terrific loss for the government and placing the fault on the prosecutors or others in the government. However that is not the conclusion counter terror experts are giving in postmortem analysis. 

It also does not take into account what we now know went on behind the closed doors of the jury deliberations. The devil was in the details of this one. Next time we can win.

How much damage can one juror really do?

Only one juror chose to do interviews after Judge Fish declared a mistrial and that was 33 year old, William Neal, who was on my Top Four List of Possible Problem Jurors from observing them during the trial.  Turns out, that is exactly what Mr. Neal was—the problem juror because as he bragged in an interview a couple of days later,

"Honestly, if I had not been on that jury this would have been a different case."¹

Mr. Neal's two local interviews have revealed that, in fact, he credits himself for keeping the jury from voting their own conscience returning guilty verdicts, "For the most part a lot of the jury did believe that.  Like I said earlier, a lot of people felt that way, they just didn't vote that way."²  Neal revealed in an interview with KRLD that the juror who was dismissed after one week of deliberations believed the defendants were guilty and refused to continue debating it.  As the Dallas Morning News put it, "Mr. Neal admitted he ran roughshod over most other panelists, whose intellectual abilities he has criticized."³

Some of juror Neal's post-trial interview statements indicate that he had many strongly held opinions that if he had been transparent, he would have been eliminated during the voir dire process.  In a radio interview given two days after the verdict Neal described how he thought the prosecution had chosen him for the jury panel: "For me, I think my answers looked like I was a pro-American, flag waving American."

Then back peddling, Neal said, "I mean I am, but they thought I was not going to be able to think for myself and just go on the facts....I think they were looking for a different juror...I think they were looking for someone [who would say] 'Oh, they're guilty, just because!'....That I wouldn't question them because my father was in the military."⁴  

Neal seems to forget that the defense attorneys also used the written questionnaire to assess the backgrounds and potential biases of prospective jurors before seating them on a jury panel.  The defense (who used a jury consultant) took a chance on choosing Neal because his father was in military intelligence, but the prosecution took a chance seeing Neal's own occupation was an art director. He was a bad selection for the prosecution.

One of questions prosecutors asked of all the prospective jurors was whether they could convict someone of supporting terrorism if that support was in the form of humanitarian aid.  According to Dallas Morning News report "Holy Land defendants long wait ends as U.S. vows to retry case,”"many in the potential jury pool admitted they could not and were excused.  All the jurors empanelled on the HLF trial assured lawyers for both sides they could apply the law fairly without prejudice.

Apparently juror William Neal was not exactly honest in response to this question and did bring other rather strong opinions into the case which he was coy about in the voir dire process. 

In post trial interviews Neal admitted that his view of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is that the Palestinians "are oppressed by the Israeli government."  He also did not believe that Hamas is strictly a terrorist group as it has been designated by the U.S. government. Neal said of Hamas in post trial interviews, "Part of it does terrorists acts, but it's a political movement. It’s an uprising."⁵

The talkative juror also said the prosecution of the Holy Land Foundation defendants was primarily a politically driven agenda by President Bush who personally announced the closure of HLF in December 2001.  "George Bush shut them down and he's just trying to make sure that he gets that case closed," he told KRLD interviewers two days after the verdict. ⁶

This accusation ignores that the FBI had the Holy Land Foundation on its radar from the first year of the Clinton administration.  In 1993 Israeli intelligence passed along the confessions of a Palestinian-born Chicago businessman who had been arrested by Israeli security for couriering funds from the U.S. into the Palestinian-controlled areas.

[Although Mohamad Salah would later recant saying he was tortured into talking, he was connected to senior Hamas leaders in the U.S. and Britain.  Salah also identified the Holy Land Foundation as the chief fund-raising arm of Hamas. ⁷  Salah pleaded guilty to Israeli charges in 1995 of helping to smuggle $650,000 to Hamas.  He served nearly five years in an Israeli prison and then returned to the United States. In July of 2007 Salah was convicted in a Chicago lawsuit for lying about not having terrorist ties.]

14-year Old Evidence.  Why the long wait?
Try 8 years of intelligence gathering only during Clinton administration. 

The age of the evidence was obviously not a problem in 2004 for the successful civil litigation against the Holy Land Foundation and two other groups brought on behalf of the family of an American teenager who was killed by a Palestinian terrorist in 1996 while standing at a bus stop in the West Bank. ⁹  

The ability to get guilty verdicts in the civil cases bears a certain similarity to the O.J. case.  The lawsuit brought an award of $156 million to the parents of the teenaged terror victim, David Boim.  Does anyone seriously think that the prosecution did not present strong enough evidence for conviction in the criminal case, but in the civil case--with less evidence than the government possessed--the civil attorneys did convince jurors of the connection between HLF and Hamas?    

Some are pointing to "old" evidence as the reason prosecutors were unable to convince the jury to convict in the HLF case. ⁸ What no one seems to be talking about is why it took so long to make the evidence public and to bring HLF to trial.  

If the 14-year wait between detection and prosecution is a factor, then the failure is with the Clinton administration to act on solid intelligence from the Israelis--intelligence the FBI was able to confirm independently within a few months.  Justice delayed cannot reasonably be laid at the feet of the Bush administration which first moved against the defendants in the first year of Bush’s presidency and pre 9/11.

During the eight years of the Clinton administration, from the first red flag raised against the Holy Land Foundation from Israelis in January 1993, and all the subsequent wiretapping and surveillance--some of the evidence ¹⁰ brought into the public light through this trial--the government under Clinton never made a move to cut off activities by the Holy Land Foundation to assist Hamas. 

It is one of the most powerful pieces of evidence entered into the HLF trial: the full transcript a 1993 strategy meeting of "The Palestine Committee" --Hamas members and supporters in the United States including some top HLF and CAIR leaders--that was secretly taped in Philadelphia by the FBI only months after the Israeli information via Mohamad Salah was shared with the United States.

The Clinton administration did nothing about the exposure of the Hamas U.S. network for two full presidential terms.

Then in the first year of the Bush administration, and in fact within one week prior to the horrific 9/11 public awakening to radical Islamic terrorism, federal agents had already made their first move to curtail the activities of HLF's sister company, INFOCom.  In boxes of information seized from the INFOcom office, agents found Holy Land Foundation records which were used in their follow up move to freeze and shut down HLF operations a few months later in December 2001. 

President Clinton was likely reluctant to shut down HLF operations because it could have interfered with his attempt to be the president to broker an end to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.  This was one of the greatest flaws of Clinton's efforts in the conflict--there was a tendency to 'see no evil' when it came to the Israeli security issues posed by Islamic terrorism.  Hamas stood for no negotiations with Israel but Yasser Arafat held them close to carry out violence when needed.

It was not simply a matter of the U.S. not having solid, confirmed evidence of the Hamas operations and agenda to oppose the Oslo peace negotiations going on in the United States.  The 1993 Philadelphia meeting transcript reveals that the meeting was specifically called to strategize how to proceed in the United States in order to thwart a peace accord from being realized in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza. ¹¹   

Whether one agrees or not with the potential for success of any peace plans and negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, allowing Hamas to work a plan in any form on U.S. soil to disrupt peace negotiations will ultimately translate to violent terrorism perpetrated on Israeli soil.  Regardless of what we think will work or not work politically, most of us can agree that cutting off anything that lends support to terrorists is a positive U.S. government action.  If some continue to see terrorism as a valid means for Palestinians to secure their future with Israel, should these people be allowed to sit on a jury if they don’t even honor the U.S. designation of Hamas as a terrorist organization?

An HLF Defense Attorney Asked the Jury:
"Are you really going to trust the government?"

Those who are really politicizing terrorism trials--the ones pointing their fingers at citizens who take the threat seriously--are seriously undermining our public safety whether it is the media, ACLU attorneys or jurors who seemingly get their position on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict straight from National Public Radio or Al Jezeera.  Some are so locked into distrust of the government that they favor trusting terrorists instead.  Who can explain such reasoning? 

"Are you really going to trust the government," was exactly the right question for at least a couple of the HLF jurors and it was repeatedly asked by Shukri Baker's attorney, Nancy Hollander.  In any re-trial, the prosecution needs jurors who aren’t locked into personal issues with authority figures. 

In his statements to the press juror William Neal expressed a lot of authority issues--from his KRLD interview comments about President Bush, the prosecution, the Israeli Shin Bet agent (which is the equivalent of our FBI), and even distrusting the defense star witness, former U.S. ambassador Edward Abington.  (Abington had a terrible reputation in Israel for a bias towards Palestinians.  After leaving his post as the U.S. Ambassador to Israel, Abington then drew a salary as a lobbyist for the Yassar Arafat's Palestinian Authority.)

Of Abington, Neal said he distrusted him because he was a politician.  "Most politicians don't want to know what's going on so they can't be held liable. The fact that he didn't know that these people could have been Hamas, he probably never asked." ¹³ 

Which brings us to a good point that a National Review editorial asked, “Were there no knowledgeable American officials who could have refuted the lobbyist's points and shored up the Israeli's [national security agent’s] testimony?” ¹⁴

As someone who sat through Abington's testimony--even knowing his leanings on the ambassadorial job in Israel---it seemed an awfully glaring hole in the prosecution case that no high level American government official was offered to counter balance the defense’s star witness. Abington was not a particularly convincing witness, but it was the authority of his office that needed to be offset by a prosecution-friendly government official.  It was not enough to challenge Abington's personal integrity or credibility since it was the office he held that lent credibility to his appearance at trial. 

National Review editors also ask if the government's case was "light on explanation" through perhaps "too much streamlining" pointing to the original estimate of several more months of testimony in the prosecution case.  There was much second-guessing going on about the trial taking too long that may have influenced the prosecution decision to cut its case short but any re-trial should try to bring in witnesses who are better able to help jurors connect the dots of the evidence presented. They need someone to paint a clear picture of how it all fits together.  The learning curve is huge and takes most of us years to get a solid grip on.  The jury has only weeks and they don’t have the background to follow bread crumbs--even big, tasty bread crumbs.

Juror Neal's authority issues aside for the moment, the U.S. government was all over the Holy Land Foundation from 1993 until HLF operations were shut down in 2001.  The intelligence the Israeli security shared with the United States was not only for Israel's sake, but for our own public safety concerns! 

Andrew McCarthy, the federal prosecutor in the trail for the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center said, "You are asking the jury to do something about a conspiracy the government has known about since 1993. It is hard to develop a sense of urgency about that."  McCarthy also noted that American juries are most interested in threats to Americans not in the threat that Hamas posed of terrorism in Israel.  ¹⁵  This is a reality that must be tackled head on in trial.  Most of the public don't really care if it doesn't touch them personally--sad but true.  Protection of the U.S. public safety has to be brought home to the next jury to hear this case.

The fact that we knowingly allowed radical Islamists to network any type of operations across our nation is a grave public safety issue which we are now paying for.  Public ignorance--due to lack of media coverage--of the true threat of these organizations in the United States is also directly related to eight long years of an administration that had no will to acknowledge or fight the presence of these networks. The point has not been sufficiently brought home to Americans that nations who have become enablers of radical Islamic terrorist organizations have ultimately suffered greatly from terrorism on their own soil. Europe is a living example of that.

In "Unholyland Foundation" Cal Thomas wrote, "Anyone in doubt about the game plan for infiltrating, undermining and attacking America from within our borders had better sober up. Our enemies know our ways and they are using them to gain a strategic advantage over us.

"From the rapid construction of mosques and Islamic schools across the country…to the use of front organizations as conduits to channel money to terrorist groups abroad, a “fifth column” has been opened in the United States." ¹⁶     

Thomas continues, "The Holy Land Foundation is not an unfairly persecuted charity. While it exhibits some charitable work as window dressing, evidence presented at the trial show its connections with known terrorist groups."

Terrorism expert Steven Emerson's Investigative Project on Terrorism gives readers a taste of the many lies HLF defendants have uttered in an effort to deceive the U.S. public about the true nature of their ‘charity’ operations in, "Silver Linings: Trial Exposed Secrets." As HLF defendant Shukri Abu Baker said in the taped 1993 Philadelphia meetings, "War is deception. Deceive, camouflage. Pretend that you’re leaving while you’re walking that way. Deceive your enemy." ¹⁷

The Investigative Project notes discussions in those meetings about how to talk to Americans without revealing their true objectives [page 7 of Government Exhibit 16-57]:  "But I cannot approach them through my strict Islamic address. I can't tell him I demand the '48 borders," HLF defendant Shukri Baker said. "No way, no way on earth, okay? No, I approach it through humanitarian suffering, refugees' rights and issues which the Americans will agree with you on."

"Exposed brothers"

That is a phrase used repeatedly in the FBI taped meetings and phone conversations between the defendants and their associates that became evidence in the HLF trial.  The term meant that the person they were discussing was publicly exposed as Hamas.   It meant these were persons who must not be connected to HLF so the HLF cover was not blown.  As the United States government began to wise up about the terrorist network in the U.S., the network--like a criminal syndicate or conspiracy--burrowed deeper under cover. 

But the media stayed away from this trial and its evidence in droves. If these men are exposed in open court but no one takes that to the public then it is like the tree that falls in the forest and no one is there to hear.  What difference will it make if the defendants now stand exposed and few know?

Another major exposure in those transcripts is the relationship of the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) leaders Nihad Awad and Omar Ahmad to Hamas and HLF. ¹⁸ These are now "exposed brothers," but the press appears to be mostly oblivious to that fact because few journalists bothered to follow the evidence presented in the trial.  The media still utilizes CAIR for statements as if it were not a tainted source proven in the evidence of this trial.

CAIR also continues to be treated by the press as a legitimate voice for Muslim civil rights and not as Hamas' public relations division running interference for the network in the U.S.  That is exactly what trial transcripts strongly indicate CAIR is.  Instead, the media carry Nihad Awad’s ridiculous comparisons of the prosecution of the Holy Land Foundation to "McCarthyism" in the 1950’s. ¹⁹    Another ridiculous comparison made to the press by the defendant Ghassan Elashi’s daughter, Noor, compared her father to Rosa Parks.   

Muslim hot button pushing and working the system does not seem to be seriously challenged by the press.  If evidence has exposed these men--and it has--then ridiculous statements like these should be challenged by the reporters. 

"The extent to which that exposure gains traction hinges on factors like media coverage," writes Mark Bergin for World Magazine. “The absence of national news reports on the HLF trial has stunned [Douglas] Farah, who spent two decades as a foreign correspondent and investigative reporter for The Washington Post and considers the story eminently newsworthy."²⁰ 

Quoting Farah in the same article regarding the reluctance to believe how dangerous and coordinated these Muslim groups are: "Most people in this country don't like conspiracy theories. When you're talking about groups that want to establish a caliphate, as the [trial] documents clearly show, it sounds scary and implausible."

In an editorial by National Review online, "Unholy Mistrial," the editors wrote, "Funding is the lifeblood of radical Islam. Organizations such as Hamas cleverly create divisions devoted to social-welfare work, not terrorist attacks. At first blush, supporting such work seems admirable. But contributions are fungible, and there is no policing what the donations subsidize after they are safely in a terrorist organization's coffers. Even if they were spent on charitable work, they would still serve to increase the prestige and recruiting appeal of organizations that pursue their objectives through mass murder. No good works can redeem a Hamas."²¹

The founder and Chairman of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, M. Zuhdi Jasser, is concerned that the HLF mistrial will provide a platform for CAIR's claims of victimization and civil-rights violations.  Jasser worries about the setback in a case where the prosecution had good evidence:  "All mistrial says is that these jurors were profoundly confused." ²²

"While speech and faith practice is certainly protected by our First Amendment, it cannot insulate individuals from accountability for the financial support of organizations which execute and employ acts of terror,"Jasser said. "I am counting on a retrial and on the DOJ making its case more convincingly and with less confusion." ²³

The Talkative Juror Provides Clues on What Went Wrong
--but not necessarily how to proceed in retrial.   

While the prosecution analysis of this case is a good and needful thing, there should be caution taken on giving too much weight to the statements made by HLF juror William Neal because he expressed distrust over just about everything and everyone in the trial.  When asked by WFAA's Rebecca Lopez, "Why do you think this case was taken to trial?"  Neal answered, "I think it was political."

"If you think about some of the witnesses," the juror continued, "one of the witnesses has been in every trial since…Marzook was arrested….Dr. Levitt….I looked…and he was listed on two other trials involving Hamas."  ²⁴  It is pretty damning stuff in Neal's eyes to be a counter-terrorism expert. 

He told interviewers in the KRLD radio interview a few days later, "All the prosecution witnesses were all biased because they've been doing this for thirteen years." 

Neal on the Israeli agent's credibility: "He admitted in open court that he was being paid to be here—completely biased!"  ²⁵  That is not even comparable to the paid professional psychiatric witnesses who are routinely used by defense attorneys to declare their clients mentally ill.  Of course the Israeli agent was on the clock. Why wouldn't he continue to be paid for traveling in the course of his capacity in the Israeli defense services to testify in a terrorism trial?

The juror's offense at Dr. Matthew Levitt as a witness is also flimsy.  Levitt is also highly qualified to testify as an expert in terrorism cases.  He is the former deputy assistant secretary for intelligence and analysis at the Treasury Department and a former FBI counterterrorism analyst specializing in tracking terrorists' money. 

According a Dallas Morning News article, "Experts split as prosecutors consider retrial in Holy Land case," Dr. Levitt says retrying the case is vital, not only as a deterrent, but also to hold enablers of violence accountable.  "These people…have not been cleared." 

While Dr. Levitt says, "I believe there is formidable evidence,"²⁶ juror William Neal offered his opinion that a retrial would be a "waste" of time.  "I think they’re just going to come to the same conclusion, in fact, wait until George Bush is out of office and it’ll be a different story." ²⁷  So much for Neal's claims to be an unbiased juror just basing his opinion on the facts of the case. 

That may not be the only information juror Neal gave to the media that was heavily laced with his own prejudices. He may have not been exactly accurate about the unanimity of the jury panel on October 18^th when the verdict was handed over to the court magistrate.  

A must-read article by Miriam Rozen in Texas Lawyer magazine, "The Decision Making Behind the Wait for the HLF Verdict," has gone into the U.S. District Court Northern District of Texas, with quotes from the court officials on exactly how the events unfolded.

Rozen not only clears up how the decision was made to handle the verdict if it came in while Judge Fish was attending an out of state conference with both the prosecution and defense attorneys.  She further reports that Paul D. Stickney, the assigned U.S. magistrate judge on the case, "recalls that earlier on [Thursday] Oct. 18, one juror seemed upset and concerned about the jury's decisions. Stickney says she asked if the individual jurors would be polled.

"On Oct. 22, before the 10 a.m. scheduled proceeding, juror No. 7 wrote a note to the judge asking: '1. Are we going to be polled? 2. Does undecided mean (not guilty). If we are not going to be polled I would like to give my statement with the court reporter there on some of charges with the defendants will you please let me know. ..." ²⁸

As I close this follow up two outstanding items remain: 

The first is the explanation of a Dallas Morning News editor, Rod Dreher writing on a related news story in a Beliefnet blog, the article titled, "Shut up or, inshallah, we'll sue." (Shut up or, by God, we'll sue.)  In it Dreher discusses how radical Islamists are using libel lawsuits to intimidate and silence critics.  Apparently that is a strategy that has been working for them on some.  ²⁹  I’m reminded, however, of one of the adages that came out of post-Nazi German: "All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing."

On that note, my final comment here is a heartfelt thank you to the prosecution team of First Assistant U.S. Attorney Jim Jacks, Barry Jonas, a trial attorney for the U.S. Department of Justice in the Counter-Terrorism Section, Assistant U.S. Attorney Nathan Garrett, and Elizabeth J. Shapiro of the DOJ's Civil Division in Washington, D.C.  Also a salute to FBI agents Lara Burns and Robert Miranda who have been on the case for many years fighting the good fight.   

From my vantage point this team did an outstanding job in an aggressive, impassioned prosecution of an extremely difficult case.  It is a good thing we have warriors like them ready to go into battle.  They are to be commended....and also encouraged to continue to pursue justice in this case to the end.

One of the websites devoted to covering the Holy Land Foundation from their supporters' perspective was called "Hungry4Justice."  I say we should see to it a full plate of justice is served.

 –Donna Diorio, October 30, 2007

Sources

¹ WFAA Rebecca Lopez Interview  with HLF juror William Neal, Oct 22, 2007   
   http://www.dallasnews.com/video/dallasnews/hp/index.html?nvid=185986

²  KRLD Radio Ernie and Jay Interview, October 24, 2007   
    http://www.krld.com/play_window.php?audioType=Episode&audioId=1087447

³ Experts split as prosecutors consider retrial in Holy Land case
   by Jason Trahan Dallas Morning News October 27, 2007
   http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/localnews/stories/102707dnmetholyland.365f0ff.html

⁴  KRLD Radio Ernie and Jay Interview, October 24, 2007  
    http://www.krld.com/play_window.php?audioType=Episode&audioId=1087447

⁵ Holy Land defendants long wait ends as U.S. vows to retry case
   by Jason Trahan Dallas Morning News October 23, 2007
   http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/102307dnmetholyland.367cb2b.html

⁶  KRLD Radio Ernie and Jay Interview, October 24, 2007 
    http://www.krld.com/play_window.php?audioType=Episode&audioId=1087447

⁷  U.S. investigation started after an Israeli interrogation in 1993
    By Jason Trahan Dallas Morning News October 23, 2007
   http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/city/richardson/stories/DN-    holylandcase_23met.ART.State.Edition1.423e0b0.html

⁸  KRLD Radio Ernie and Jay Interview, October 24, 2007   
    http://www.krld.com/play_window.php?audioType=Episode&audioId=1087447

⁹  Age of evidence hurt case on terror funds 
    by Thomas Korosec Houston Chronicle October 27, 2007
    http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/5251394.html

¹⁰ NEFA Foundation, Selected Government Exhibits & Documents from U.S. v. Holy Land Foundation
     http://www.nefafoundation.org/hlfdocs.html

¹¹ U.S. investigation started after an Israeli interrogation in 1993
    By Jason Trahan Dallas Morning News October 23, 2007
   http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/city/richardson/stories/DN-    holylandcase_23met.ART.State.Edition1.423e0b0.html

¹²  1993 Philadelphia Conference
Multiple headings in HLF documents at the NEFA Foundation    
http://www.nefafoundation.org/hlfdocs.html

¹³   Holy Land defendants long wait ends as U.S. vows to retry case  
   by Jason Trahan Dallas Morning News October 23, 2007
   http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/102307dnmetholyland.367cb2b.html

¹⁴  Unholy Mistrial
       National Review Editorial October 25, 2007
     http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NDk3N2ZkZTVmNmViMGJkYmUxYzJjMGIxNmI3MTJiODM=

¹⁵ Age of evidence hurt case on terror funds 
    by Thomas Korosec Houston Chronicle October 27, 2007
    http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/5251394.html

¹⁶ Unholyland Foundation
By Cal Thomas  HumanEvents. com10/24/2007
      http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=23035

¹⁷  Silver Linings: Trial Exposed Secrets
     Investigative Project on Terrorism, IPT News October 26, 2007
     http://www.investigativeproject.org/article/533

¹⁸  Audio and Transcripts entered into Government’s Evidence August 6 and 7, 2007
     United States District Court Northern District of Texas, Judges – Notable Cases
     USA v. Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development  http://www.txnd.uscourts.gov/judges/notable2.html

¹⁹ Coming Up Empty
     Mark Bergin World Magazine November 3, 2007 issue
     http://www.worldmag.com/articles/13464

²⁰  Coming Up Empty
     Mark Bergin World Magazine November 3, 2007 issue
     http://www.worldmag.com/articles/13464

²¹  Unholy Mistrial
      National Review Editorial October 25, 2007
     http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NDk3N2ZkZTVmNmViMGJkYmUxYzJjMGIxNmI3MTJiODM=

²²  Coming Up Empty
     Mark Bergin World Magazine November 3, 2007 issue
     http://www.worldmag.com/articles/13464

²³  Second HLF Trial Could Bring Changes
     Investigative Project on Terrorism October 23, 2007
     http://www.investigativeproject.org/article/532

²⁴  WFAA Rebecca Lopez Interview  with HLF juror William Neal, Oct 22, 2007 
     http://www.dallasnews.com/video/dallasnews/hp/index.html?nvid=185986

²⁵ KRLD Radio Ernie and Jay Interview, October 24, 2007   
    http://www.krld.com/play_window.php?audioType=Episode&audioId=1087447

²⁶ Experts split as prosecutors consider retrial in Holy Land case
   by Jason Trahan Dallas Morning News October 27, 2007
   http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/localnews/stories/102707dnmetholyland.365f0ff.html

²⁶  KRLD Radio Ernie and Jay Interview, October 24, 2007   
    http://www.krld.com/play_window.php?audioType=Episode&audioId=1087447

²⁸ The Decision Making Behind the Wait for the HLF Verdict
     Miriam Rozen  Texas Lawyer  October 29, 2007
    http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1193389423795

²⁹ Shut up or, inshallah, we’ll sue
      Rod Dreher October 29, 2007 Cruchy Con blog on Beliefnet.com
     http://blog.beliefnet.com/crunchycon/2007/10/shut-up-or-inshallah-well-sue.html