Freedom of flight for Habib
LES KENNEDY
SMH
December 6, 2009
MAMDOUH HABIB, who was held without charge for more than three years as a suspected terrorist, has taken to the air - and says authorities can do nothing to bring him down.
The former Guantanamo Bay inmate, who has had one training flight in a light plane, said being up in the clouds was the greatest feeling of freedom since his return to Australia four years ago.
He described the 90-minute flight over Sydney's south-west with an instructor as exhilarating.
''Now in the air no one can harass me, not even the police,'' he said. ''Up in the air no one knows me, only the birds, I feel free.''
But the father of four from Greenacre says he has not decided whether to start a full-time flight training course to get a pilot's licence.
Mr Habib, who was born in Egypt in 1956, is on medical benefits after the failure of his Sydney security and cleaning business.
He said the public and authorities had nothing to fear if he gained his pilot's licence because: ''I am not and never have been a terrorist.''
''If someone wanted to commit a terrorist act with a plane, why would they get a licence? They would not get a licence to fly a plane,'' he said at Bankstown Airport.
Mr Habib said his wife Maha had gone with him to the flying school when he took his first lesson last month.
He said he had worn a T-shirt that declared ''ASIO Traded Me'', in reference to his long court action against the Federal Government for compensation for wrongful detention and alleged kidnapping by US authorities in Pakistan when he visited that country.
Mr Habib said he had decided to learn to fly because of frustration over an eight-month delay by the Department of Immigration and Foreign Affairs to issue him with an Australian passport which would allow him to travel abroad with his family or visit his sick sister in Alexandria, Egypt's second largest city.
He produced letters from the passport office saying his application could not be considered because the office was ''awaiting advice from ASIO about whether the circumstances providing grounds for the decision to refuse to issue you a travel document remain current''.
He found the refusal to let him travel abroad was absurd as he could still fly domestically and take flying lessons without a security clearance.
Mr Habib said if he did not obtain his licence, he was considering learning to become an aircraft maintenance engineer.
''I have done nothing wrong. No one can stop me.''
So what IS the Habib story? this is part of it.
FOUR CORNERS
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Worst of the Worst?
In "Worst of the Worst?" Four Corners looks at the most revealing and comprehensive account so far about Egyptian-born Habib, and what he did before he was detained at Guantanamo Bay and deprived of his legal rights.
Date: 20/07/2004
SALLY NEIGHBOUR, REPORTER: In November 2001 in Hamburg, German police interrogators went to work on two suspected al-Qaeda recruits arrested in Pakistan in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks on America. The two suspects were linked with the now-infamous Hamburg cell, headed by the September 11 ringleader Mohammed Atta. The pair had been captured after leaving a training camp in Afghanistan in the days after the attacks. The two suspects were grilled for days about their al-Qaeda links and their training and about an Australian man who had been arrested with them.
INTERROGATING OFFICER (TRANSLATION): What can you say about the Australian? What was his name and what did he tell you?
BEKIM ADEMI (TRANSLATION): He came from Sydney. He's married with four children.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: The Sydney man named by the two Germans was well known to the Australian authorities. He had been watched by ASIO for years in a long saga leading up to his capture.
IBRAHIM DIAB (TRANSLATION): He planned to move to Pakistan with his family. Later in prison, I found out his name. It was Mamdouh Habib.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Almost three years later, Mamdouh Habib's family is still waiting for him to come home. Habib is one of two Australians incarcerated in Guantanamo Bay, reportedly beaten, abused and tormented, and until two weeks ago denied any legal rights. The two Germans who named him have long since been released. And exactly why Habib is still being held remains largely a mystery.
Tonight on Four Corners, we piece together the troubled story of Mamdouh Habib, the cleaner turned coffee shop owner and father of four from suburban Sydney who somehow ended up in the prison camp America reserves for the men it calls "the worst of the worst".
In 1995, caught on home video playing at the beach with his children, Mamdouh Habib looks like a man without a worry in the world. Habib had moved to Australia from Egypt in 1984, married a local Lebanese-Australian girl, Maha, and had two sons and a daughter, with a second girl to follow.
IBRAHIM FRASER, FRIEND: Mamdouh is a great guy. He's really family-oriented and very dedicated to his family.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: The Habib family settled in Sydney's south-west. Habib ran a cleaning company and later opened a coffee shop in Haldon Street, Lakemba.
IBRAHIM FRASER: Well, this is Haldon Street. I go up and down Haldon Street all the time. Just up here, next to the National Bank here, is the coffee shop that Mamdouh owned. It's really funny coming back.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: One of his regular customers was a local taxi driver Ibrahim Fraser, an Australian-born Muslim convert who lived nearby.
IBRAHIM FRASER: Mamdouh, to me, is friendly and outgoing and, uh, very interested in people and, you know, the welfare of people.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib's cafe in Lakemba's main shopping strip was a popular meeting place for the Lebanese and Egyptian-born communities. His friend Khalil Chami, who runs a bookshop in Haldon Street, says Habib threw himself into community life.
SHEIK KHALIL CHAMI, ISLAMIC WELFARE CENTRE: I mean, he's active and he was working hard with the community and he invited people and he's not selfish. I mean, he's a person... I mean, he will invite you to coffee and he will never take money for the coffee. He is very generous in this line.
MAHA HABIB: He's always said to the kids, you know, he said, "No matter what, if anyone ever asks you for any help and you can help, don't hesitate to do it, because one day you will need someone."
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib's wife Maha would not be interviewed for this program. This interview was filmed by 'The 7:30 Report' in late May.
MAHA HABIB: And he's always told them, "Never be afraid of the truth, because if you've done anything wrong, alright, you have to face your problem, OK?"
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib prayed at the Lakemba mosque and taught Islamic scripture at a local high school. His friends say he was not an extremist but took his faith seriously.
IBRAHIM FRASER: He told me that, you know, to be a good Muslim you had to live Islam, and that's what he did. He lived Islam and to me he was a great inspiration, Islamically.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib was a follower of Australia's most senior Islamic cleric, Sheik Taj, a man whose views have been called extreme. Sheik Taj was almost deported in the '80s for comments like this.
(HOME VIDEO FOOTAGE FROM 1988 PLAYS)
SHEIK TAJ ON VIDEO (TRANSLATION): The Jews try to control the world through sex, then sexual perversion, then the promotion of espionage, treachery and economic hoarding.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Sheik Taj has mellowed over the years, although he was condemned again more recently for calling the September 11 attacks "God's work against oppressors." Habib too was a man of strong views.
SHEIK TAJ ALDIN AL-HILALY (TRANSLATION): He was always trying to put his nose into everything, to poke his nose into a lot of things. He was a talkative man. Always interfering in matters regardless of whether they interested him or not. That was part of his personality. He was sharp and aggressive. He would get angry quickly and then calm down quickly. Mamdouh is like that - he always brings problems upon himself.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: In 1991 Mamdouh Habib took his family on a holiday to his native Egypt and then to see his sisters in New York. It was on this journey that his problems began.
While Habib was in New York, a celebrated court case was under way. It was the trial of an Islamic militant El Sayyid Nosair, who was charged with shooting dead an extremist rabbi, Meir Kahana, during a function at a New York hotel. Every day during the trial, rival camps of Muslim and Jewish protesters gathered outside the court. Mamdouh Habib was invited by an old school friend to join the crowd who rallied to yell support for the accused killer.
MAHA HABIB: Someone has said that, um, there was a person who'd been accused of killing some, I don't know, um, Jewish... What do you call them? Um, 'rab...'
INTERVIEWER: Rabbi.
MAHA HABIB: Rabbi, yeah. And his case is running. "Just for out of support, do you want to come?" I went to court too.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: The man who invited Habib to join the protest was an old friend from his school days in Egypt, Ibrahim El-Gabrowny, a cousin of the accused killer. Also at the court was another friend of Habib's, Mahmud Abouhalima. The men were all followers of the militant Egyptian-born cleric Omar Abdul Rahman, known as the 'blind sheik', who urged his flock to "kill the enemies of God" and rid the world of the descendants of "apes and pigs fed at the table of Zionism, communism and imperialism".
The blind sheik's followers were jubilant when Nosair was acquitted of the murder despite having been arrested with the gun still in his hand. He was convicted on gun charges instead. Mamdouh Habib joined in the celebrations.
MAHA HABIB: What's wrong with going to court? I can go to any court now and see any...hear any hearings. Is that wrong?
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: 15 months after Habib's trip to America, the World Trade Center in New York was bombed, leaving six people dead and more than 1,000 injured. The blind sheik Omar Abdul Rahman and Habib's friends El-Gabrowny and Abouhalima were arrested and later convicted over the attack and plans to bomb other New York landmarks.
MAHA HABIB: Put it this way - say if your friends from school...you had your friends from school, OK? And you used to go with them to school and afterwards, you know, um, you'd met them after you got married and, you know, long time ago, and whatever they've done wrong, would that blame you too?
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Back home in Sydney, Habib took up the blind sheik's cause, organising a protest to support the jailed cleric whom he described as his teacher.
SHEIK ABU AYMAN, NATIONAL EMIR, AHLUS SUNNAH WAL JAMA'AH: I heard him say, "I was one of the students of this man." This is from his mouth to the brothers - not to me in particular, but to everyone.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: He said he was a student of the blind sheik?
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: Yep. That's what he said.
SHEIK TAJ ALDIN AL-HILALY, MUFTI, AUSTRALIAN ISLAMIC COMMUNITY (TRANSLATION): He used to come and argue with me in my office many, many times. I used to listen to him. "Should be, do something, should be. We have to support the case of Dr Omar Abdul Rahman, he's innocent." I would say, "OK, God willing." He would get angry and leave my office, very upset. The same thing happened many times. He would come to see me, we would disagree, then he would come back after a few months and try again.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: From his home in Sydney's west, Habib stayed in contact with his friends in New York. Phone records produced in the US court case revealed a series of calls between Habib's house and the men on trial for the bombing. Habib later claimed he was discussing a business deal with his friend El-Gabrowny and fundraising for the blind sheik.
INTERVIEWER: There is some evidence that he had connections with terrorists, though, isn't there? For example, the phone calls with...
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib's lawyer Stephen Hopper refused to be interviewed for this program. This interview was filmed by Four Corners last year.
STEPHEN HOPPER, LAWYER FOR HABIB: It was about $500, which was raised by Mamdouh from the community, and the reason why that money was raised is there seemed to be a debate over whether the US authorities were giving the sheik his diabetes medication. And this has been documented in the press.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib's contacts with the World Trade Center bombers and his support for the blind sheik aroused the interest of ASIO, which paid him a call. The knock on the door - in late '93 by his wife's account - would be the first of many.
STEPHEN HOPPER: We know from about 1996 until the time he left to Pakistan in July 2001, ASIO had put him under scrutiny. And that's quite a number of years. But during all that time there were no charges ever laid and in the latter part of it, ASIO asked him to be an informer for them and offered to put him on a payroll. And Mamdouh Habib refused to do that. He didn't want to spy for anybody.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: While the home videos continued to show the same old smiling Mamdouh, beneath the happy exterior was a man under mounting pressure. The attention from ASIO was not his main worry. Business was going badly. Habib's cleaning company had a contract with the Defence Housing Authority cleaning defence homes. After a series of complaints that his work was substandard, Habib lost the job.
IBRAHIM FRASER, FRIEND: He said that he was cheated and that the Government owed him all this money and that he was victimised on grounds...on the basis that he was Muslim and Egyptian.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: After Habib made a series of angry phone calls, the Defence Housing Authority took out an apprehended violence order against him. In court, witnesses told of abuse and threats by Habib.
(EXTRACTS FROM WITNESS EVIDENCE PLAY)
WOMAN: He became very angry. He said it was unfair what we had done to him and his company and he was going to get us for that.
WOMAN 2: He said to me, "I'll tell you what happened to a woman who was working for some people. She had acid thrown in her face and she was badly damaged by that." I said, "So what has that got to do with me?" And he said, "Nothing, but people have to be very careful."
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: His psychiatrist testified that Habib was suffering from major depression and was being treated with Prozac, but that he was not prone to violence.
(WITNESS EVIDENCE CONTINUES)
MAN: He is irritable. He has been preoccupied with a sense of hopelessness about his future. He has become withdrawn and he has been very agitated at home and he has been crying excessively as well. There is no evidence to suggest that he is aggressive or about to become aggressive or violent. He is not dangerous at this point.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: During the court case, police searched Habib's home and found a gun and ammunition that he held under licence. The magistrate ordered the gun destroyed and Habib's shooter's licence was cancelled. The Defence Housing Authority got an AVO for five years.
IBRAHIM FRASER: He felt that because it was the Government, the Government always wins - the Government's on the side of the Government and that's it.
SHEIK TAJ ALDIN AL-HILALY, MUFTI, AUSTRALIAN ISLAMIC COMMUNITY (TRANSLATION): He used to imagine that... He used to think that he was a victim, that he was being discriminated against and that everyone was against him. He felt that there were hidden forces watching him - that was a delusion. I used to try and make things easier for him and give him psychological support, but he had those delusions.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: After falling out with Sheik Taj, Habib began attending a more radical mosque just up the road in Lakemba. The prayer room in the arcade off Haldon Street is well known to ASIO for the sometimes extreme views that are preached there. Its spiritual leader is Sheik Abu Ayman. The sheik remembers Habib well from the day Habib trooped up the stairs to the prayer room dressed in a karate suit.
SHEIK ABU AYMAN, NATIONAL EMIR, AHLUS SUNNAH WAL JAMA'AH: Usually I don't recognise people, but when he came to talk to me and he had special hat, this ninja hat or something like that, and white suit and black belt. And I know these kind of people. I've been across so many people in my life. And I saw him that night with these clothes on, just I gave him a big smile.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: What did you think about that?
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: Better not... (Laughs) Sorry about that, but... (Laughs) Better not to say what I was thinking about.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: According to Abu Ayman, Habib became even more conspicuous for the argumentative ways he brought with him.
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: I would say he is an attention seeker. I would say he loves the people to give their ears to him. And again, I could say he's a disturbed man. If you don't agree with him, he will accuse you of every name under the sun, and again, this is not a normal thing from a normal person to do.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: What would he argue about?
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: The hot issues that people argue about these days. It started with Sheik Omar Abdul Rahman, then Osama bin Laden, then jihad - this is the issues that people argue about these days.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: And what would he say about Osama bin Laden and jihad?
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: Now, he's in trouble already. I don't want to make him in a worse situation, but it's been recorded and I'm sure the Government knew about it. He used to wear the photo of Osama bin Laden, his T-shirt. As I said, this is a childish thing. A man doesn't do that. Even if you love someone, you don't wear a shirt like... This is for the children.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib was certainly not the only one in the prayer room to support Bin Laden and advocate jihad or holy struggle. Abu Ayman and his congregation have been under close watch for years because of the extreme views expressed by some of his followers. The man who runs the prayer room, Abdul Salam Zoud, was named in a French court dossier as a recruiter for jihad - a claim he denies. Several men who have attended the prayer room are currently facing terrorism-related charges.
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: Most of it is ill talk based on no evidence whatsoever. And that's the fact. They have to blame someone. There is always...in any agenda, there is a scapegoat. It has to be all the time someone to put the blame on. And this is why you find us sometimes, yes, saying something the public doesn't like, for example, or the Government doesn't like.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: The reason the Government doesn't like what's preached in the prayer room is apparent from the sermons available on video in the bookshop up the road.
(FOOTAGE FROM 'THE ENEMY'S PLOT' PLAYS)
SHEIK FEIZ: What is really meant by the term, by the wording, by the so-called war on terrorism? Does it leave any doubt in anyone's mind that it is nothing but a war on Islam and the Muslims to ensure the Zionist - those pigs - the Zionist-American domination in every corner of this earth?
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: This is one offering from Abu Ayman's star protege, a young firebrand from Liverpool known as Sheik Feiz, whose weekly lectures in the prayer room Mamdouh Habib used to attend.
(VIDEO FOOTAGE CONTINUES)
SHEIK FEIZ: Go to Iraq today and see your brothers and sisters! See them! See what is happening there! It's gonna happen to you one day! Their heads are being blown off, their legs are being amputated, their arms, their bodies. Their meat is being just thrown off their bodies. Look! And we are too comfortable with cultivation! We're too scared to go to jihad! What are you living for?
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: The call to jihad was like a magnet for Habib. He was so enthused he began signing people up, according to Abu Ayman.
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: So they give their names. Then they find out after that he's collecting these names for so-called jihad or something like that.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: What do you mean by that? What do you mean "collecting names for jihad"?
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: Who wants to go to jihad, or something like that.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: So was he trying to get people to go overseas to fight, do you mean?
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: I would say that, yes.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Do you know where?
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: No, but it's obvious. That time was Chechnya and Chechnya was the main area, the hot area in that time.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: It wouldn't have been the first time someone from the prayer room headed off to jihad. Other followers of Abu Ayman are known to have trained and fought with militant Islamic groups overseas. But for a group already under suspicion, Habib's overt lobbying and collecting of names was dangerous. He was told to stop.
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: This is the problem. Loud mouth is a big problem. To go and do whatever you want. The Government want to blame us for that. It's your problem and it's your personal issues. We cannot stop anyone to do what he wants to do, except in the area we are authorised to stop. And this is what we did.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: In March 2000, Habib packed his bags and headed off overseas. His destination was not Chechnya but Pakistan. He was away for just under two months. Habib's exact movements are unclear but he spoke to his friend Ibrahim Fraser before he left.
IBRAHIM FRASER: I met him at a cafe in Lakemba and he discussed to me that he had plans to go to Afghanistan to live an Islamic life in the Bin Laden camp. He felt that that was a good life to lead. He thought that would be good for his children. He thought that his children would have an Islamic upbringing and that they would also be able to study the Koran and everything Islamic. So he told me that. I said to him, "So do you mean that you would go for jihad?" And he said, "Well, if that's...if that was necessary, because..." He said, "But I really only want to live there. I'm not really interested in jihad, but I really want to live with Bin Laden."
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: According to Australian authorities, Habib travelled to Pakistan and Afghanistan. Four Corners has been told that on this trip he did military training with the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Toiba, which has since been listed as a banned terrorist group in Australia. The authorities say that notes from an L-e-T weapons course were later found in Habib's home. Several months later, back in Lakemba, Ibrahim Fraser spotted his friend again in Haldon Street.
IBRAHIM FRASER: I said, "Oh, well, so how was Afghanistan?" He said "Great." He said, "This is truly a great place."
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Did he tell you what he'd done there?
IBRAHIM FRASER: No, he didn't tell me whether he'd done anything in Afghanistan. He didn't tell me...he didn't say that he'd been on jihad. He hadn't said that he had done any training. He just told me that he'd been looking for a...that he'd been to...met Bin Laden and been there and found it to be a really great place and...
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: He said he'd met Bin Laden?
IBRAHIM FRASER: I think so. I think he had. I think that's what he said.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: In the lead-up to the Sydney Olympics, the police and ASIO stepped up their interest in Habib. The authorities didn't know at this stage of his movements overseas but they were keen to pump him for information on the prayer room, which was now under close surveillance.
Habib wrote to the Inspector-General of Intelligence, the first of many written complaints to a range of authorities.
LETTER FROM MAMDOUH HABIB TO THE INSPECTOR-GENERAL: "Dear Sir, I would like to lodge a formal complaint against the ASIO. I have been harassed by them for over 5 years. I am facing a lot of problems and I request help from your department to seek for my rights. If I do not have the help from your department, I will consider to seek for my rights in a different country."
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: The Inspector-General later wrote back to inform Habib that ASIO did not intend to interview him again, except in the unlikely event that new information came to hand. But by this time, Habib's contacts with ASIO were an open secret in Haldon Street. Rumours swirled around Lakemba that Habib was a spy.
IBRAHIM FRASER: I remember once somebody said to me, "Just be careful about this guy." And I said "Why?" I mean, "What's wrong with Mamdouh?" you know. And they said, "No, you've got to be careful because he...he's got connections."
SHEIK ABU AYMAN, NATIONAL EMIR, AHLUS SUNNAH WAL JAMA'AH: We are under scrutiny from the Government and from everyone. Then someone come to say to us, "Let's go to jihad. Let's do that. Let's do this." And first thing comes to your mind - "That man wants to put us in trouble." That's why he wants to say, "Yes, yeah, let's go." Then he will go and report us. This is what...a normal thing to think about these people. And you don't blame anyone. This doesn't mean he is.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: But you thought he was working for ASIO or the Government trying to make trouble for you?
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: Doesn't mean he is, but it's normal to think he is.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: As the rumours escalated, Habib started complaining to his local MP, the Labor Member for East Hills, Alan Ashton.
ALAN ASHTON, MEMBER FOR EAST HILLS: He told me that the problem he had there was that the mosque authorities were accusing him of being, essentially, either an ASIO agent or a CIA agent. And that they had declared him at one stage... He used this word to me - 'halal'. And there are various definitions of that term, but the impression I got from him was that this meant that he could be killed - or sacrificed, if you like - if at any time he came into the Lakemba area and attempted to go to that mosque.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: The bad blood between Habib and the men of the prayer room came to a head when a stranger from an Islamic group in Holland showed up collecting funds for the Chechen mujahadeen. The Dutchman, known as Abu Zer, was befriended by Habib. Abu Ayman and his colleagues became angry when they learned the visitor was using their group's name to raise funds. The sheiks confiscated the Dutchman's passport and demanded he give the money back.
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: We never heard of this man. We didn't know anything about him. Now, we don't give anyone the authority to collect any money for any reason whatsoever.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib described the argument with the man who runs the prayer room in a letter to his MP, Alan Ashton.
EXTRACT FROM MAMDOUH HABIB'S LETTER TO ALAN ASHTON: "He also said in front of many people that if I ever do come back to this mosque, he will break my head and cut my legs and hands into pieces."
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib claims that you said to him that you would break his head and cut his legs and hands into pieces and that you said - you asked, and I quote, "every Muslim to have him killed because his blood is halal".
SHEIK ABDUL SALAM, NSW EMIRE, AHLUS SUNNAH WAL JAMA'AH: I didn't say like this. I didn't say this. And I was surprised first when I heard from you now I said this. I deny it. And I challenge if I did say these words.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: What did you say to him?
SHEIK ABDUL SALAM: Just, "Please, Mamdouh, please don't come to this prayer room." He said, "Why?" I said, "You know why. Because you're making trouble with the...some people and I want...I don't want any trouble to be in my place here or in the prayer room."
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: The dispute at the prayer room ended in blows when Habib showed up again with a video camera and began filming people as they left through the arcade.
Why was he doing that? Why was he filming people?
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: For so many reasons. A disturbed man, or a man wants to make trouble, they can, for teasing us enough...to create a problem. Maybe he's not shooting at all, he just putting the camera like this and letting the people feel they are being recorded, so they go and make a fight.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Two men were charged with assaulting Habib. One was the former Qantas baggage handler Bilal Khazal, currently facing charges of making documents likely to facilitate terrorism. The assault charges were eventually dropped for lack of a complainant after Habib's arrest. The Bankstown police investigated Habib's complaints to Alan Ashton of threats to himself and his family. The police concluded that the sole issue was Habib having been barred from the mosque and that his accusations were "grossly exaggerated and fictional". But in Habib's mind it all remained very real.
ALAN ASHTON, MEMBER FOR EAST HILLS: I think he was very frightened. He wrote one letter that just virtually headlined the letter, "It was a cold-blooded murder attempt," and he's underlined it. And then he goes on to describe having guns pointed at him and other things that happened. So by this stage he was very fearful, I think, for his life and his wife and his children.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib also complained to Alan Ashton's office that he'd been abused at his children's school and that rumours were being spread there that he was a spy.
ALLAN WINTERBOTTOM, ASHTON'S ELECTORATE ASSISTANT: He rang late one evening and he said about the problems with the children and, er, various people at the school were making it very uncomfortable for his children to attend. And he mentioned about the mosque where he was allegedly assaulted. And I suggested why doesn't he go to another school and another mosque and he raised his voice and said that he'd rather kill his own children than to change his place of worship.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: By early 2001, behind the familiar smiling face of Mamdouh Habib there was clearly a man on the edge. At a meeting with Bankstown police, Habib was described as showing "signs of hostility towards government organisations and the community generally". The Protective Services Group was asked to do "a detailed threat assessment" of Mr Habib. The final conclusion was that there was no information to support concerns that Habib might carry out an act of violence. The police decided Habib was "a repetitious and vexatious complainant" and that "little credibility could be attributed to any threats or allegations he may make".
ALAN ASHTON: While he never made any threats and never said anything that you would take to be a threat, it was just all the contacts he had and all the letters and that frustration. And occasionally his conversation with me would be along the lines of, "Do I have to leave the country?" And that's what he did.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: On July 29, 2001, Mamdouh Habib headed overseas again. His destination was Pakistan. He told several people he was going to find a religious school for his children.
MAHA HABIB: Believe it or not, we were going to go all together. All of us, you know, to see... We've heard that Pakistan has a very good reputation in teaching the kids the Koran, memorising the Koran, alright? And I guarantee you, whoever memorise the Koran and understand it, there won't be any problem. There won't be any, um, you know... Because knowing the Koran is a way of life, OK?
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib's exact movements after he arrived in Pakistan are once again unclear. His wife, Maha, claims he travelled only within Pakistan. The Australian Government claims Habib was in Afghanistan when the attacks on America took place on September 11 that year.
All that the Government has said publicly is that Habib is alleged to have trained with al-Qaeda. Four Corners has been given a more detailed account. We're told that while he was in Afghanistan, Habib did an advanced al-Qaeda training course in a camp near Kabul. It's claimed the course included surveillance and photographing facilities, the establishment and use of safe houses, covert travel and writing secret reports. Australian authorities say that several other men who took part in the course identified Habib as having been there. Evidence to support these claims is still to be produced.
IBRAHIM FRASER, FRIEND: I don't believe he's a terrorist. I just believe he's Mamdouh Habib looking for a place for his children to study. I mean, to do training doesn't mean to say that you actually participated in any war. People join the army but they don't all go to war. They do the training and not all people go to war.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: In the wake of September 11, ASIO raided and searched Habib's home. It was just after this that Maha Habib spoke to her husband for the last time.
MAHA HABIB: I told him. He said, "Have we got anything to hide?" I said, "No." He said, "Then don't worry about it." That's what he said and he was so calm about it. He said, "Just don't worry. Just relax." I was really upset. I asked him, actually, "Have you found a school?" And he didn't... Actually he didn't sound too good. He said, "Don't worry. I'll tell you when I come. Everything's upside down." That's after September 11. So he said, "I'll tell you all about it when I come home."
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib called again a few days later when no-one was home and left a message.
MAHA HABIB: Last thing we've heard was on the answering machine. He was saying, "I'm on my way back home." So we felt happy, you know, and I said, "That's it. He's coming!"
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib was in Quetta, near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, on his way home. It was there he met the two Germans, Ibrahim Diab and Bekim Ademi, who were also heading home from Afghanistan.
IBRAHIM DIAB (TRANSLATION): When we arrived at the bus stop, we met an Australian. He told us he was going to look for a school for his children, but that he didn't like Pakistan. Like us, he was planning to go back home as quickly as possible. We went with him by taxi to the town centre because we planned to buy presents for our families there. The Australian bought shoes for his daughter.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib and the Germans took a bus for Karachi. But five hours into their journey, the bus was stopped by Pakistani police and the two Germans were hauled off. It apparently wasn't Habib they were after. Four Corners has been told that it was only when Habib piped up and protested in his usual fashion about the treatment of his companions that the Pakistanis said, "Well, if you're travelling with them, you can come too," and arrested Habib as well.
INTERROGATING OFFICER (TRANSLATION): I'm asking you again when and where you met the Australian, Habib.
IBRAHIM DIAB (TRANSLATION): I met him at the bus stop in Quetta.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: The two Germans were released after their government intervened on their behalf. Under lengthy interrogation, they said nothing that incriminated Habib.
INTERROGATING OFFICER (TRANSLATION): We have information that the Australian, Habib, was also in a training camp near Kabul. Did you see him there? Did he tell you about that?
BEKIM ADEMI (TRANSLATION): No. I didn't see him in the camps I was in. Nor did he tell us that he had been into a training camp.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Unlike the Germans, the Australian Government has made no effort to have its citizen brought home.
PHILIP RUDDOCK, ATTORNEY GENERAL: If people go abroad to train with terrorist organisations, to learn how to use weapons against civilian populations, uh, they do pose a significant risk to your society.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Since his capture in Pakistan, the Government has seemed quite happy to have someone else deal with Mamdouh Habib. The Government is even less keen to have Habib brought home after advice from the Director of Public Prosecutions that neither he nor the other Australian in Guantanamo Bay, David Hicks, has committed any offence under Australian law at the time.
PHILIP RUDDOCK: The United States sought advice from us as to whether we could successfully prosecute Hicks and Habib and the advice they received from us is they could not be. Um, so our view has always been that if there were serious issues to be tried and the United States believed they were in a position to pursue those matters, it would be foolish for us to be seeking their return to Australia in the knowledge that they would have to be released.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: From Pakistan, Habib was sent to Egypt, where he was kept blindfolded and reportedly tortured for several months.
EXTRACT FROM LETTER FROM MAMDOUH HABIB TO MAHA HABIB: "I've been in too many different places - I never know where I am... I've been blindfolded for eight months - I never see the sun, but I see you and our kids every minute. I never forget you or forget my children."
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Habib was then sent to Guantanamo Bay, where he's been held now for more than two years, beaten and abused, according to the accounts of former detainees. The label "worst of the worst" used for the men held here has now been exposed as a fiction.
TORIN NELSON, FORMER GUANTANAMO BAY INTERROGATOR: Almost everybody that has come down to Guantanamo Bay to work there has usually gotten off the plane thinking that they're going to be working with 600-plus al-Qaeda and hard-core Taliban members. And then after not too long a period when they actually interact with them, they find that the majority of these individuals are...distantly removed from that type of idea. And you can see this evident in the fact that so few charges have been brought up against the detainees that are actually there.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: Mamdouh Habib's family has heard nothing from him since March last year. His wife can only imagine the state he might be in. She's heard reports that can't be confirmed that he's dazed and confused, has refused his medication for depression, believes his family is dead.
MAHA HABIB: There's no correspondence, there's no letters. And he is... The Red Cross actually has said that he is refusing to write back. But why would he refuse to write back, you know? Doesn't... There's no explanation. I can't understand it.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: It may be many more years before Habib's family sees him again, because even after his trial by a US military commission, there is no guarantee he'll be released as long as the so-called 'war on terror' continues.
PHILIP RUDDOCK, ATTORNEY GENERAL: The argument that the United States has taken is that, in this war in which they're engaged, they don't wish to release people that they believe are likely to go back and resume hostilities.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: But that would blow away one of the most fundamental principles of the rule of law, would it not, if they were to do their time and still not be released?
PHILIP RUDDOCK: As I understand it, one of the...one of the accepted principles in the conduct of war under Geneva Conventions is that prisoners of war are held until the end of hostilities.
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: And in this case, that could be 50 years?
PHILIP RUDDOCK: Well, we don't know, do we?
SALLY NEIGHBOUR: What we do know is that there's no happy ending in sight to the long and sorry story of Mamdouh Habib.
What was your reaction when you learned he was in Guantanamo Bay?
SHEIK ABU AYMAN: Somehow, I wasn't surprised, because a man with a big mouth like this, he will end up there. In another way I was really shocked, because the assessment of the Government should be better than anyone else. They know he's a disturbed man, they know his background. He never did a real threat or a real problem for the Government or for outsiders. But the Government didn't do anything to let the American understand "This is not the right man in your hand. He is not what he claims he is." He is a disturbed man. He doesn't deserve that punishment for his big mouth.
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