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Politics : World Affairs Discussion -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: lorne who wrote (1710)	8/29/2002 12:30:44 AM
From: Thomas M.	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3959

Alleged Mosque Bombing Plot Thwarted Florida Police Find Explosives, Manuals, Target List in Podiatrist's Home By Rachel La Corte The Associated Press T A M P A, Fla., Aug. 23 — A podiatrist arrested after authorities found a stash of guns and explosives in his home was planning to destroy an Islamic education center and dozens of mosques, court records revealed today. Dr. Robert J. Goldstein, 37, was charged with possession of a non-registered destructive device and attempting to use an explosive to damage and destroy Islamic centers. During a search of his Seminole home, deputies found a typed list of approximately 50 Islamic worship centers in the Tampa/St. Petersburg area and elsewhere in the state. They also found detailed plans for destroying an Islamic education center with the use of bombs. The location of the Islamic education center targeted was not disclosed. "It looks like this guy was going to target some Islamic mosques," Pinellas County Sheriff's Detective Cal Dennie said. "He had a list of what he wanted to target and the directions on how to get there." Suspect’s Wife Notified Police Residents were evacuated overnight from the townhome complex after Goldstein's wife, Kristi, had called police, saying her husband was acting unstable. Kristi Goldstein said her husband had threatened to kill her, according to an affidavit by ATF Special Agent James Booth. After half an hour, police talked Robert Goldstein out of the home and he was placed in custody under the Baker Act, which allows involuntary commitment for analysis. Detective Cal Dennie said today that police found a cache of up to 40 weapons, including .50-caliber machine guns and sniper rifles. "You have to have a special license to get this stuff and he does," said Dennie, who said Goldstein had no criminal record. House Full of Explosives, Manuals But he also had more than 30 explosive devices, including hand grenades and a 5-gallon gasoline bomb with a timer and a wire attached, Dennie said. "It's a number of destructive devices he had, pretty sophisticated stuff," he said. "He had an elaborate system, with video cameras and everything." Deputies also found five or six rectangular packages with timers on them. The Hillsborough County bomb squad from Tampa and federal bomb experts were called to the scene, and the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms officially took over the case. "He had books on how to make bombs and he was using VCR tapes and walkie-talkies as a means to explode bombs," Dennie said. Townhouse Complex Could Have Been Destroyed The 25 to 30 residents who were displaced were allowed back after police opened a safe thought to have contained explosives. There were only more guns in the safe, said Special Agent Carlos Baixauli with the ATF Tampa field division. "If one of those bombs were to have gone off, that townhouse would have been destroyed," Baixauli said. "If the others exploded, we would have lost most of that townhouse complex." abcnews.go.com

To: lorne who wrote (1710)	8/29/2002 12:46:32 AM
From: Thomas M.	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3959

Eight years after Hebron massacre, another Goldstein plots Florida remake JERUSALEM (AFP) - They share the same profession, the same nationality and even the same name. Before his arrest in Florida, Robert Goldstein was about to follow in the footsteps of Baruch Goldstein, who massacred 29 Muslims in a Hebron mosque eight years ago. Parallel pictures of the two Goldsteins were splashed across the daily Maariv's centre-spread and most Israeli newspapers drew a parallel between the two Jewish extremists in their Sunday editions. Doctor Robert Goldstein, 37, was arrested by US security services Friday on suspicion of planning to bomb mosques and Islamic centres, after a huge arsenal of around 40 weapons and 30 explosive devices was found at his Florida home. A typed list of approximately 50 Islamic places of worship in the Tampa and St. Petersburg areas was also found, and the doctor was still being questioned Sunday. On February 25, 1994, Baruch Goldstein sprayed automatic gunfire on worshippers praying in a mosque in the Cave of the Patriarchs, a holy site in both Islam and Judaism, killing 29 Muslims before being lynched. An American who lived in a Jewish settlement in the heart of the southern West Bank city of Hebron, Goldstein went on his suicidal shooting spree in a bid to avenge the victims of Palestinians attacks. However many more Israelis were to die in the following months during a wave of revenge bombings by the Palestinian militant group Hamas. The 1994 massacre was widely condemned in Israel, but a minority of extremist Jewish settlers have since turned Baruch Goldstein into an icon of their struggle against the Arabs. His tomb became a pilgrimage destination for some far-right supporters, and a book singing his praise and written by an extremist rabbi has been circulating on the black market. Baruch Goldstein's grave was symbolically dug at the entrance of the Kiryat Arba settlement near Hebron, at the end of Meir Kahana street, named after the founder of the anti-Arab Kach party, who was himself assassinated in New York. Following the 1994 massacre, Kach was officially outlawed over charges of incitement to racial hatred, but its militants have continued to be openly active, calling for Palestinians to be expelled from the entire "land of Israel", including the West Bank, and accusing successive Israeli governments of weakness or even treason. Only after a group of Jewish extremists close to the Kach party were caught on April 30 preparing an anti-Palestinian attack near a school did the police carry out some arrests. A few weeks earlier, a bomb attack which had also targeted a Palestinian school in east Jerusalem had been claimed by an underground extreme-right group. Bloodshed was averted when two other bombs were defused on the same site, while a fourth one was also discovered nearby. Since the intifada erupted on September 28, at least 12 Palestinians have been killed by Jewish extremists, B'Tselem said, adding that in most cases the killers were not found. Official Israeli reports have expressed concern at the impunity of some of the most militant settlers, especially those in Hebron. arabia.com