Links between IHH and Al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups...

A nasty bunch of people...

1. In 2006 the Danish Institute for International Studies reported that during the 1990s the Turkish relief organization IHH had links with Al-Qaeda and global jihad networks.2 The well-documented report was prepared by Evan Kohlman,3 an American scholar specializing in Al-Qaeda. The study deals with the involvement of Islamic charitable societies in supporting terrorism. Pages 10-14 are devoted to IHH.

2. According to the study, the Turkish government began investigating IHH at least as far back as December 1997 following information that senior IHH activists had purchased automatic weapons from extremist Islamic organizations. As a result, the Istanbul offices of the organization were raided and activists were arrested. During the raid the Turkish security services found weapons, explosives, instructions for manufacturing IEDs and a flag bearing a jihadist message. An analysis of the documents taken from the offices indicated that IHH members were planning to participate in jihad activities in Afghanistan, Bosnia and Chechnya.

3. For the report in its entirety, see
http://www.diis.dk/graphics/Publications/WP2006/DIIS%20WP%202006-7.web.pdf