[From the NYT story on the man trying to sell shoulder-launched missiles to Islamists]:
“Two other men arrested on Tuesday were also identified today. Prosecutors said one was Yehuda Abraham, a 76-year-old jeweler from New York. The other was Moinuddeen Ahmed Hameed, a 38-year-old citizen of India who, the government said, arrived in the New York area on Tuesday from Malaysia.”
Not even sure this is a GD. But . . . . at the risk of jumping to conclusions, I’ll infer from his name and his occupation on 47th St. in N.Y.'s Diamond District that Mr. Abraham is of the Mosaic faith.
Why, why, why, would he cooperate with a guy who was such a crazy scumbag, eager to cooperate with any suppositious Muslim terrorist in killing the enemies of Islam . . . when the enemies of Islam include, first and foremost, Mr. Abraham’s own (I assume) people? Does he not realize that abetting those who attack America is abetting the death-to-Israel crowd, given that the anti-American Islamist fervor stems largely from U.S.-Israel ties?
If there’s a GD here, I’ll phrase it thusly: Is someone’s evil even more blameworthy when it has the obvious tendency to hurt “his own?”
The diamond district attracts all sorts of unsavory characters due to its involvement in money laundering, drug smuggling, prostitution, arms dealing, etc. It is indeed a Mosaic mosaic. Al Qaeda bought conflict diamonds in Sierra Leone and sold them in diamond exchanges in Tel Aviv and Antwerp. Whoever they sold them to didn’t face Mecca when they prayed.
"The arms dealers cannot be viewed in isolation, however. The diamond industry took little action to police itself as gemstones became one of the prime currencies in Africaís wars and, it was later revealed, for terrorists. With so-called conflict diamonds being laundered through the exchanges of Antwerp and Tel Aviv, the industry responded only after it was challenged by nongovernmental organizations such as Global Witness, whose campaign against blood diamonds created so much bad publicity that the industry was forced to devise measures to clamp down on stones from conflict zones._
“Bush administration officials initially opposed international moves to impose strict controls on the purchase and sale of diamonds, but softened their stance after reports that Osama bin Laden made good use of the diamond trade in West Africa, employing the dealers and networks that had helped to fund rebel forces in Angola and Sierra Leone. U.S Rep. Tony Hall, an Ohio Democrat who sponsored legislation to place trade sanctions on countries that sell diamonds to finance war or terrorism, said after the legislation was approved that reports on Bin Ladenís role in the trade ìput us over the edge.”
Has there been demonstrated proof that Yehuda Abraham knew that the person he was dealing with was an (illegal) arms dealer? Remember commerce has no religion and I don’t think that Jewish businessmen should stop doing business with Muslim businessmen because there’s an off chance you might be supporting terrorist groups (and from the perspective of the Muslim businessman, the chance your business partner might be supporting Israel).