Another Member of the Islamist "Hofstad" group arrested by Dutch police

Friday 28 October 2005 the police arrested a 28 year old terror suspect who allegedly, was a member of the "Hofstadgroep", a group of Dutch Islamists. According to members of the group, which was responsible for the murder of Dutch Cineast and Enfant Terrible Theo van Gogh, the man was a Police snitch.

The accused supplied one of the handgranades, which was used by members of the group to resist their arrest during the siege of the groups hideaway in Den haag, late in 2004. Two members of the SWAT team were severely injured.

The police confirmed that the suspect, a 28 year old with dual Morroccan - Dutch citizenship was arrested in connection with an investigation into Islamist terrorist activities and preparations. The arrest was made on the basis of testimony given to by terrorist suspects Jason W. and Samir A. in a television broadcast on Thursday. Convicted terrorist Jason W. told the Newscast editors of "Netwerk" from his jail cell that he got 2 handgranades from the suspect. Jason W. had not mentioned this during the police interogation.

The investigation also looks into the suspect's involvement with the robbery of a drugstore in Rotterdam. Samir A. confirmed that the former member of the terrorist cell was involved in the drugstore robbery, which was committed in order to fund the activities of the Islamists. The members of the Hofstad group started to distrust the 28 year old suspect as he was not arrested despite being prominent in the operations of the cell. The man was very radical in his views and often called for armed struggle against the Kufaar, the unbelievers.

In the days just before the arrest of Jason W. and Ismail A. the suspect was a frequent visitor to their safe house. The interior secret service AIVD recorded all the conversations in the house concerned, but erased many of the recordings: due to "lack of storage capacity". It is suspected that the real reason for the dissappearance of the recordings is the need to protect the alleged informer.

The dissapearance of the records is also eerily reminiscent of the dissapearance of the negatives of dozens of pictures taken by Dutch soldiers during the fall of the UN Safe Haven of Srebrenica in Bosnia in 1995, which caused mayor embarrasement to Dutch authorities.