Alan Johnston and the Durmush clan

(Arik Weiss, Ma'ariv April 18, 2007)

The prime suspect in Alan Johnston's abduction is naturally the Durmush clan (and here and actually all over the net) of Gaza – an organized crime family with many ramifications operating a private militia of several hundred armed terrorists, whose infamous record boasts several similar cases, such as the abduction of two Fox News journalists in August 2006. Rumor has it that USD 2 million bought the release of Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig.
Up until a few months ago, the relationships between Hamas and the Durmush clan were fruitful and idyllic. Hamas often employed the services of the clan for contracted jobs (assassinations and other dirty work) in exchange for hefty sums of money and constant supply of weapons. The clan's name seems to be connected with the abduction of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit. The "romance" ended a few months ago when two Durmushes were killed by Hamas gunmen. It appears that Alan Johnston was abducted in order to renew the income lost in the wake of the Hamas-Durmush feud.
An unknown terrorist group in Gaza claimed recently to have executed the BBC correspondent and even promised to release the videotape of the "event", but the footage was never produced. It appears however that the journalist was killed in the abduction and the fake promise was meant only to clear the Durmush clan of the suspicion of abduction and possibly murder. The BBC has been silent all along, probably reluctant to offend the kidnappers by some inappropriate comment. After all, one never knows, the group holding Johnston might be ideology-driven, and that would complicate the situation greatly (I don't get it, most British journalists are such suckers for Palestinian lies and propaganda, that someone like Chas Newkey Burden is frowned upon when visiting Israel for a travel piece; the Palestinians should be licking the asses of British journalists instead of kidnapping and maltreating them – who knows, perhaps even killing them. Sorry, British journalists, I thought you were smarter than that!!! On the other hand, it's not that, it's your irrational anti-Semitism that turns you into such obsequious lackeys ).
Some 20 journalists have been abducted in Gaza in the past few years, and behind inflammatory declarations there were hierarchy skirmishes or cash shortages involved in all instances. Johnston's abduction seemed just another one of those, except one can never be certain that things wouldn't take a turn for the worst (after all, contrary to general belief, Gaza IS a terrorist haven, I might quote Dante's Inferno – Relinquish all hope, ye who enter here. Gaza is Inferno made in the Palestinian Authority with the assistance of Hamas).
Last year, Amit Cohen of Ma'ariv wrote that the American Intelligence Services warned the PA of contacts between an Al-Qaeda operative and a Gaza resident, and that the Gaza resident received USD 5,000 from Al-Qaeda in order to purchase weapons and attack Westerners, mostly US nationals. Luckily, the Gazan resident was apprehended before doing any harm. British officials fear that Johnston's kidnappers may have been acting on behalf of Al-Qaeda (after all it is no secret that Al-Qaeda has been operating in Gaza for some time now).
A close friend of Alan's, Stephen Farrell of the Sunday Times, says the Gaza is so complex and stratified, that it is premature to conclude that Alan is being held by a certain family. As it is practically impossible to distinguish in Gaza between ideology, money and business, one can never be sure of the real cause behind Alan's abduction was, or who it was that kidnapped him. "But this is our line of work," Farrell says, "and this is what we have to cope with, always fearing a missile launched from an IAF helicopter (you just couldn't help releasing that stinking fart via you buccal orifice, now could you, how many journalists were killed by attack helicopters? And while you are at it, don't you know IAF pilots never release a single missile, it's always a double strike, Mr. Farrell, objective journalist!!!), being shot by a Palestinian sniper (that's more like it) or getting caught in the crossfire of two rival gangs shooting it out in the streets of Gaza (now you're talking!).
Farrell himself had a similar experience while being held for ten hours by Sunnis in Iraq: "I know that the real reasons behind Alan's abduction are far more complex than money or faction rivalry, because nobody really knows what's going on in Gaza." (What are you doing over there then, how can you do any honest reporting? Oh, I forget, you are a British journalist, i.e. you can get away with pointing an accusing finger at Israel.)

Prior to Alan Johnston, no-one had been held in Gaza for more than two weeks:
September 27, 2004: Riad Ali, a producer for CNN, was seized at gunpoint from a car in Gaza City. He was freed the following day. CNN said a tape surfaced shortly before Ali’s release in which the producer said he was being held by the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, a militant Palestinian group with ties to Fatah. The brigade had earlier denied involvement in the kidnapping and had joined other groups in condemning it. Ali said on the tape that he is a Druze, a minority Arab population in Israel whose members often serve in the Israeli army. He called for the Druze not to serve in the Israeli army. No demands were made.
January 8, 2005: Ramon Lobo and Carmen Secanella, El Pais. Reporter Lobo and photographer Secanella of the Spanish daily El Pais were briefly abducted by masked gunmen in Gaza’s Khan Younes refugee camp. They were released unharmed 90 minutes later.
August 15, 2005: Mohammed Ouathi, France 3. Ouathi, a soundman for French television channel France 3, was forced into a car on August 15 by three men with rifles as he walked to his hotel in Gaza City with France 3 colleagues. He was released on August 22. No group claimed responsibility for Ouathi’s abduction. Reuters reported that a Palestinian militant umbrella group called the Popular Resistance Committees said it had helped mediate Ouathi’s release, but it did not identify the kidnappers.
September 10, 2005: Lorenzo Cremonesi, Corriere della Serra. Masked gunmen abducted Italian journalist Cremonesi, of the newspaper Corriere della Serra, in the town of Deir el-Balah in the central Gaza Strip. He was released later that day unharmed. He claimed that all his abductors wanted "was to see their faces on Al-Jazeera."
October 12, 2005: Dion Nissenbaum, Adam Pletts, Knight Ridder. Nissenbaum, a U.S. reporter for the Knight Ridder newspaper chain, and British photographer Pletts, a freelancer working for the news organization, were abducted by armed gunmen in the southern Gaza Strip. “A car followed our vehicle for three or four minutes and then stopped us. Six gunmen pointed their weapons and said ’We want the foreigners,’” Ziad Abu Mustafa, a Palestinian interpreter who was with the journalists, told Reuters. He said the captors ordered him to stay behind as they drove off with the two journalists, heading toward the southern Gaza town of Rafah. The journalists were freed later that day after several hours in captivity. Palestinian security officials said the men were kidnapped by renegade members of the ruling Fatah party, CPJ sources said. They said Fatah officials and Palestinian security officers negotiated their release.
March 14, 2006: Caroline Laurent, Elle, Alfred Yaghobzadeh, SIPA, Yong Tae-young, KBS. Gunmen seized Laurent, a reporter for the French women’s weekly Elle, Yaghobzadeh, a photographer from the photo agency SIPA, and Tae-young, a correspondent for South Korea’s public broadcaster KBS, at the Al-Dira Hotel in Gaza. All three were released unharmed 22 hours later. Palestinian security services said the kidnappers were members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, Reuters reported at the time. The abductions came after Israeli forces stormed a prison in the West Bank town of Jericho and seized a PFLP leader, Ahmad Saadat, and five other group members held in connection with the assassination of an Israeli minister.
August 14, 2006: Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig, Fox News Channel. Centanni and Wiig, a correspondent and freelance cameraman respectively for Fox News Channel, were ambushed by gunmen on Omar al-Mukhtar Street in the center of Gaza City. Two vehicles trapped the journalists’ satellite uplink truck marked “TV.” Gunmen forced the driver to the ground, and abducted the two journalists. A previously unknown group called the Holy Jihad Brigades later claimed responsibility. The group demanded the release of Muslim prisoners held by the United States. The journalists were released unharmed on August 27. They were videotaped converting to Islam and reciting suras. They were also forced to praise their captors in a press conference.
October 24, 2006: Emilio Morenatti, Associated Press photographer, was abducted by unidentified Palestinian gunmen as he walked out of his Gaza City apartment toward his driver and interpreter Majed Hamdan, the AP reported. Hamdan said four gunmen grabbed his keys and phone and told him to turn away, pressing a gun to his head, and threatening to harm him. The gunmen shoved Morenatti into a white Volkswagen and sped off. He was released later that day. The AP said no group claimed responsibility for the kidnapping. (However, Morenatti seems to be quite close to the terrorists, perhaps rivals of the faction that kidnapped him? We'll never know, Stephen Farrell himself cannot make his mind up. However, Morenatti appears to be a very good friend of Kevin Frayer, who eagerly promotes anti-Israeli propaganda, as seen in his contributions from Gaza/West Bank (on an almost daily basis) and Lebanon (during the second Lebanon war).
January 1, 2007: Jaime Razuri, Agence France-Presse, a veteran staff photographer for AFP, was seized by a group of unmasked, armed men as he was entering the news agency’s bureau in Gaza City, AFP reported. He had been returning from an assignment with his interpreter and driver. Razuri was released on January 7. It is unclear who abducted him. Palestinian security officials suspected that the Dughmush family, a large armed clan in Gaza City, was behind the abduction. The Dughmush clan had been pressuring the ruling Islamic Resistance Movement to turn over 18 people suspected of killing two of its members, according to reports and CPJ sources. But an aide to President Mahmoud Abbas said the family helped in releasing the journalist and was not directly linked to the abduction. (Dughmush is an alternate spelling of Durmush.)

The Palestinian Butcher at Work

By Nadav Ha'etzni
Ma'ariv (Saturday supplement) 02.02,2007,

Even if one took a magnifying glass to the international media reports one would fail to find any mention of the horrors going right here and, before our very eyes. Leading Israeli journalists travel to Africa to document the atrocities of genocide and child abuse. Drama unfolds when a Palestinian girl is accidentally killed by IDF fire (cool it, Nadav, she may have been killed by a stone thrown by Palestinian demonstrators) but nobody bothers to report the bloodcurdling carnage taking place right here and now, in Gaza and the West Bank.
In order to fill in the gaps, this is what has been going on in Gaza during the past few weeks: Palestinians gunmen wake up sleeping Palestinian children when there are no armed rivals or rescuers around, and kill them in their beds. Or riddle schoolchildren with bullets as they make their way to or from school. They also strip the rival faction women of their clothes and march them naked through the streets. They stop ambulances and slaughter the sick and the wounded if they belong to the rival faction. In the Shifa Hospital they disconnect the medical equipment necessary to treat injured opponents. Fierce gunfighting is raging in the hallways. A Hamas clinic was blown up by Fatah. Last week, armed Fatah men broke into a Jebalya mosque and started spraying everyone with bullets. As a result, 14 worshippers were wounded. Several of them died of their wounds. Unlike the shooting of Moslem worshippers several years ago in the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron by a Jewish settler, the Gaza mosque bloodbath passed largely unnoticed. Why should anyone bother? Arabs killing one another are not newsworthy.
Fatah gunmen accompanied by journalists are patrolling Shchem, in search for Hamas loyalists. While queuing up at the bank, they found Fayed al-Akbar, a Hamas local council member , attacked and abducted him while the cameras were running. In a nearby village, they shot an Al-Najah University woman lecturer in the legs, because of her open support for Hamas. In Hebron they shoot at each other every night. Murder, abduction and torture have become the daily routine in Samaria.
When some horror eventually makes the headlines, it is usually associated with Hamas. The media were quick to report the destruction of a holiday village owned by Dahlan – the Americans' darling. Dahlan himself, tucked away in an armored vehicle convoy, is touring Gaza and pouring millions of US aid into the slaughter. The Fatah pogrom perpetrators seem to have the upper hand.
The fighting seems to be conducted by mercenaries on the payroll of murder contractors. Some of them, such as the Durmush clan, reported to have "bought" IDF Corporal Gilad Shalit and to be currently holding him, jump ship to serve the highest bidder. This modest blog has already mentioned that they occasionally snatch foreign journalists. Lately, some of them seem to be carrying out executions for Fatah, having deserted Hamas ranks for a fistful of US dollars.
So why isn't the media reporting any of these? Where are Channel Two's Arab reporters? Where are the self-righteous correspondents from Ha'aretz? Where's the CNN and its competitors? Where is the UN? Where are Yossi Beilin and Uri Avneri? (I might also ask where are the vociferous Arab MK's: Ahmad Tibi, Bishara, Barakeh and the rest of the fifth column ? or should I say filth column?) By the way, has Be'Tselem buried its head in the sand? A long time ago Itzhak Rabin argued that the Palestinians would annihilate terrorism without the assistance of our Supreme Court and Be'Tselem. Instead, terror is on the rise, but guess what, Be'Tselem (Israeli Human Rights Watch) is unavailable at the moment (most likely in search of some Israeli settlers abusing a Palestinian olive tree).
This slaughter spree is being financed by several nations. One side receives direct aid from Bush and Olmert, while its enemy is being backed by Iran and Syria. Only this week the US administration has poured US $ 86 million into the pockets of Fatah murderers. We have also contributed US $ 100 million to keep Abu-Mazen's Fatah squads butchering children and wounded Hamas gunmen, and acquiring more weapons and ammo, as if they did not have enough already. The arsenal on both sides is quite remarkable, and not only in post-disengagement Gaza, where any arms dealer can sell almost anything. In the West Bank, five minutes away from Kfar-Saba and Jerusalem, arms are being amassed in unprecedented quantities. About 2,000 Hamas terrorists have marched through the streets of Qalqilyiah, in full combat gear and armed to the teeth. Last week the good ole Fatah boys rallied in Ramallah to celebrate Fatah' 42nd anniversary with and unprecedented display of weapons.
Now the Egyptians have come up with the grand idea of a creating a Palestinian army. Soon we will be contributing a tank regiment and an air force wing to stregthen Abu-Mazen's Al-Aksa Martyrs Brigades.
Why, the reader may ask, do we support Abu-Mazen little pogromists? Why, because they are on "our side". Even though this week they succeeded in blowing up three innocent Jews in Eilat
(suicide bomber caught on surveillance camera here), they remain our mythological peace partner. Yet two weeks ago Abu-Mazen urged the Palestinian warring factions to bury their feud and resume killing Israelis . But why discard a wonderful concept just because reality slaps you in the face? The Palestianian butchers go on unabated, except that for a change, they are slaughtering one another. And the world remains silent.

Like I said, unless one is a victim of IDF (or US troops) "violence", one is not a legitimate victim.
As I was posting this, I heard a Gaza resident giving the next account on TV: People don't go outdoors for fear of getting caught in the crossfire. Roadblocks have been set up everywhere, some by Fatah, some by Hamas. They stop traffic and shoot at random. His neighbor's son was shot while riding his bicycle. The whole situation has gone out of control.
Zvika Yehezkieli, the charismatic Channel 10 Arab desk editor, reported that hell has broken loose in Gaza. Everybody is settling old scores (Mafia style blood vendettas). The death squads are acting on their own, i.e. they are not taking orders from their bosses anymore.
Yes, let them have their state, a persistent vegetative state...

Viagra in the Service of the Hezbollah

By Amit Cohen
Maariv, December 8, 2006


Ten facts on the green fuel that sets the wheels of terror in motion. Millions of dollars' worth of stolen medicine and contraband cigarettes sold in America. A lucrative industry of abducting people for ransom. Banks that can do nothing about it.

1. This scenario has become almost routine in Gaza: gunmen or unmarked vehicles ambush passing cars, preferably with foreign nationals inside. The unsuspecting passengers are then dragged out of their car at gunpoint and driven to secret locations. The abduction is carried out in a couple of minutes and is over in several days. So far no Gaza abduction has resulted in bloodshed, for one reason only: it is business. The rationale behind snatching foreign nationals is purely financial: ransom, extortion or employment opportunities. It is very difficult to try and estimate how much money found its way into the Palestinian terror business coffers thanks to the practice of abduction, since all the abductees deny having ever paid for their freedom - e.g., Spanish Foreign Secretary Miguel Moratinos denies having paid any kind of ransom for the release of abducted Spanish AP photographer Emilio Morenatti.
2. We got some kind of clue as to the sums paid for the release of foreign nationals this last August, when Fox journalists Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig were detained by a group calling itself "Holy Jihad Group" that threatened to execute the two hostages and even forced them to convert to Islam in front of the cameras. When they were freed 13 days later, there were allegations that Fox News had paid $2 million for their release. But not according to Gaza officials, who claim that $200,000 had been the price of their freedom, and that the tab was picked up by Hamas. According to Palestinian sources, the man behind the abduction was
Muataz Durmush and here, head of National Resistance Front branch. The Durmush clan is considered one of the most dangerous in Gaza and is in fact closely connected to Hamas. Mumtaz Durmush, Muataz' brother, is the one who snatched IDF corporal Gilad Shalit and here together with Hamas. Muataz Durmush's branch, as well as other branches, receives monthly funding from Hamas for their supporting the organization or for carrying out attacks on its behalf. However, at some stage, Hamas decided to cut Muataz' funding. This angered Muataz, who abducted the two Fox journalists and threatened to kill them in order to "embarrass" and compromise Hamas in the eyes of public opinion. Following lengthy negotiations, Hamas gave in and paid Durmush the requested ransom, as per the monthly budget received until the abduction.
3. Taking hostages for ransom has also become the favorite source of funding for terrorist organizations operating in Iraq. This article published by the New York Times reveals that foreign governments, such as France and Italy, paid Iraqi terrorists over $ 30 million for the release of their abducted nationals during the last year alone. The document also reveals that last year terrorist operations succeeded in raising $ 70-200 million dollars. The money was made by means of extensive criminal operations such as smuggling oil, counterfeiting money and fund-raising through fictitious charities. But even these sums appear somewhat conservative versus the estimations of the Iraqi Oil Ministry. According to figures released by the Iraqi government, the local terror groups managed to raise $ 200 million by oil-smuggling alone.



4. Terror-funding in Iraq has changed significantly since the beginning of the Second Gulf War. During the first year of the hostilities terror was funded by Saddam loyalists. But in 2004 foreign couriers began bringing suitcases full of cash into Iraq. Currently, Iraqi terrorists can sustain themselves without any kind of foreign assistance. This financial independence makes it very difficult to put and end to terrorism or to attempt to cut its financial lifeline. These huge cash stashes go to show how extremely difficult it is for the US administration to deal with terror in Iraq, and they also explain the current Iraqi government failure to freeze the money flow into the insurgents' coffers. Estimates go so far as to suggest that if nothing changes, the insurgents will not only be able to fund their own operations in Iraq, but also to extend financial support to terrorist organizations worldwide.
5. Despite Iranian funding, Hezbollah also resorts to criminal activities to increase its budget – 19 people were brought to trial in the US this year for fundraising on behalf of the Hezbollah by means of illegal activities such as selling stolen Viagra pills and smuggled cigarettes, extortion, theft and money laundering to the tune of over $ 20 million.
6. Following 9/11 the White House decided that terrorist organizations, mainly Al-Qaeda, should be separated from their cash sources, assuming that if there is no money, there will be no terror. But reality backfired. Blocking money channels proved impossible, while the destruction of several financial routes brought about a change in the modus operandi. True, the annual Al-Qaeda budget was cut down from $ 30 million to a mere couple million, but at the same time the cost of terror activities also went down significantly. The 9/11 attack cost half a million dollars, while the Madrid and London cost a mere few thousand dollars. This forced the US intelligence services to re-evaluate their priorities. US officials are now admitting that the main goal is not to divert the terror funds, but rather to follow the money trail in order to identify and locate terror infrastructures. A US official report maintains that freezing assets is not the only or most important objective of monitoring the money trail; it is a means of identifying terrorists or their supporters, and has become instrumental in the war against terror groups.
7. "This is a cat and mouse game", says Yair Dagan, a specialist in the prevention of money laundering and terror sponsoring. "We are always one step behind the terrorists. Attempts to thwart terrorist funding are bound to fail, much like the battle against crime. Terror organizations are beginning to employ financing patterns similar to those used by organized crime." Dagan also maintains that the banking system is unable to cope with this trend. However, he claims, the intelligence community is more apt do deal with it if they turn to non-banking areas." He is worried that Israel cannot keep up with what is going on in the world at large. "The Israeli law prohibiting terror funding compels financial organizations to check all transactions with the Ministry of Defense black list, which is incomplete, to say the least, and full of typos, and this makes it very difficult for the checkers to pinpoint suspects. For instance, the Al-Aksa fund set up by the Hamas appears only once on the Israeli blacklist, while on the US list it is mentioned over 180 times."
8. The US administration has recently admitted that the special powers it enjoyed in the first stages of the war waged against terror are beginning to wear out. The war on terror was authorized mainly by a special executive order issued a few days after 9/11, which placed the crackdown on terror funds at the top of the priority list. At the time, President Bush promised to "starve the terrorists of funding, turn them against each other, rout them out of their safe hiding places and bring them to justice." But last month, for the first time since the order was issued, a federal judge ruled to limit the President's authority. Judge Audrey Collins overruled the President's decision to freeze the assets of two organizations defined as "terrorist" – the Tamil Tigers and the PKK. The judge cancelled the executive order allowing the US Treasury the privilege to blacklist suspected terror sponsors.
9. Banks are most likely the ones to suffer because of terror funding. The Royal Bank of Scotland was sued recently for managing a Hamas-linked charity. Previously, American terror attack victims sued French Credit Lyonnais for Hamas funds funneling. A huge $ 875 million dollar suit was filed against the Arab Bank by families of suicide bombings victims. Such suits are a serious threat to banks. Since these are civil suits, the prosecution does not need to prove that the bank actually knew about the terror connection, all it needs is to make the jury think so. In fact, this suspicion acts as indirect aid to terror sponsors. Banks unwilling to risk being associated with terrorist assets flood the system with tens of millions of reports, which make it very difficult to pinpoint the real blood money.
10. Attempt by banks to freeze automatically charity funds suspected of being connected to terrorist organizations are facing judiciary difficulties. A Michigan-based Moslem charity an American bank for violation of its civic rights, because the bank was planning to shut down the accounts of the organization in the wake of an FBI raid of its premises and haul of documents and computers form its offices (and here).