The French-language Islamist website Assabyle.com, which had posted inciting and antisemitic content and was shut down for several years, has come back online in order to recruit support for Sheikh Bassam Ayachi, a French citizen of Syrian origin who is detained in Italy on suspicion of ties with Al-Qaeda and involvement in terrorism.
The site was closed down in 2006 after its two administrators – Abdel Rahman Ayachi (26) and French convert to Islam Raphaël Gendron, aka Abdel Raouf (30) – were convicted of racism and Holocaust denial and were each sentenced to 10 months in prison and fined 2,000 Euros. The two were arrested after the site posted an article titled "The End of the People of Israel," which described the Jews as "cunning and base... apes and pigs."[1] At the time, the site was closely affiliated with the Belgian Islamic Center, which carried out Islamist activities in Belgium.
In November 2008, the Italian police arrested Raphaël Gendron and Bassam Ayachi (63), Abdel Rahman Ayachi's father, on suspicion of planning terror attacks in Britain and in France, specifically in Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris. The two were arrested along with five illegal immigrants – three Palestinians and two Syrians – who were riding with them in their vehicle. According to the Italian daily La Repubblica, they had obtained weapons and explosives, and had also set up a network for recruiting suicide bombers for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
After their arrest, Assabyle.com came back online (http://www.assabyle.com/fr/page/acceuil.php), and posted a petition for their release. The site is regularly updated by Abdel Rahman Ayachi, who posts under the username "Abounour," and its main aim is to enlist support for the two and raise funds for their defense. It features scans of handwritten letters they sent from prison, as well as a translated transcript of a conversation they held in prison, which was recorded and is being used against them, and which the site describes as innocuous. There is also contact information and bank account information for those who wish to make donations.
This review, the first in a series on Islamist websites in Europe, provides a description of the site.
Homepage
The main page of the site, which officially belongs to the "Committee for the Defense of Sheikh Bassam," states: "Sheikh Bassam is one of Europe's most renowned Muslim imams… He taught a simple and original [brand of] Islam, from an open and independent perspective. He was free and committed in preaching his beliefs – which are similar to those of the vast majority of Muslims. However, he did not hesitate to address politics and current affairs from a critical [perspective]. His speeches were published in the media and on the Internet, and [were sold] in bookshops, [so] the Sheikh became a troubling and alarming [force in the eyes of the authorities]… As a result of a Zionist plot, [he] was sentenced to a lengthy term in prison..."
The site forum – which allegedly has some 30 members – features 56 posts by "Abounour" and only a few posts by a handful of others.
Assabyle.com homepage
Petition
The petition "against the unjust imprisonment of Sheikh Bassam," addressed to "the French, Swiss and Belgian Governments," was posted on November 15, 2009, and has 378 signatures to date.
The petition
Donations
The section devoted to donations clarifies that the Committee for the Defense of Sheikh Bassam, managed by the detainees' families, has no official legal status, and that this is an advantage, because it means that it "has no legal obligations whatsoever…" Several options for donating are provided: via the Internet, by mail, and also by hand (a telephone number is supplied).
Call for donations, with bank account information
Address for sending donations by mail
Letters and Transcript of Conversation
Also on the site is a scan of a handwritten letter, dated October 8, 2010, from Gendron Raphaël to Abdel Rahman Ayachi. In the letter, written in French (with occasional words in Arabic), Raphaël asked Ayachi to send him money through MoneyGram, and added: "I haven't had news from your father in several months, and I am worried about him."
Letter by Gendron (aka Abdel Raouf)
http://www.assabyle.com/documents/PP2.JPG
http://www.assabyle.com/documents/PP3.jpg
There is also a scan of a letter from August 8 by Bassam Ayachi himself.
Letter by Bassam Ayachi
In it, he wrote he was feeling fine and that he would be brought before a judge on August 19, 2010 to clarify why he "threw shit at the Italian secular democracy." He added that he needed nothing "except an immense earthquake [would] pitch these liars and all their possessions into the sea." He called the Italian government "Mafiosi" and "[members of] a filthy race" but commented that he liked the Italian people and intended to learn Italian.
The site also presents what is described as a French translation of a conversation between Bassam Ayachi and Raphaël Gendron, which was recorded and is being used as evidence against them. According to the Italian authorities, Ayachi mentioned a French airplane in this conversation (which was held in Arabic), and Gendron mentioned "hitting De Gaulle." The site maintains that these are lies inserted by whoever translated the conversation. For the site's transcript, see http://www.assabyle.com/documents/transcription.doc,
http://www.assabyle.com/documents/traduction2.doc).
In his latest post, dated December 9, 2010, Abounour states that his father spent 20 days in solitary confinement, and that his trial has been postponed to January 20, 2011 because "they do not know what to accuse him of... and their translator [who translated the conversation] wrote lies [and then]... completely disappeared."
* N. Maruani is a research fellow at MEMRI.
