Brother: Israel arrested deported imam

The former imam of Ohio's largest mosque, who was deported to his native West Bank last week, was arrested by Israeli authorities after crossing from Jordan, his brother said Monday.

Fawaz Damra, 47, had been jailed in Monroe County, Mich., for a year while awaiting deportation for concealing his aid to Islamic Jihad _ classified by the U.S. as a terrorist group _ when he applied for U.S. citizenship in 1994. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced his removal Friday.

His brother, Nabil Damra, said the Red Cross and the Center for the Defense of the Individual, an Israeli advocacy group for Palestinians in Israeli-occupied territories, told him that Fawaz Damra was in custody and had been taken to Israel's Al Jalameh detention facility in Israel, near Jenin, West Bank.

Israeli military and security officials had no comment, and a Red Cross official in Jerusalem said he did not know of the case.

Nabil Damra, speaking through a translator by phone from the West Bank, said: "He was arrested the moment he arrived to the border."

A lawyer had been hired for his brother, he said.

"Our biggest fear is that he might stand trial in Israel," said Don Bryant, Damra's friend and president of the Greater Cleveland Immigrant Support Network. "This is a nightmare for him."

Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesman Greg Palmore said Damra was flown to Jordan on Thursday and handed over to Palestinian authorities at the Allenby Bridge, which connects Jordan to the West Bank. Any crossers must first go through an Israeli-controlled checkpoint.

If Damra had been arrested, Palmore said, Palestinian _ not U.S. _ authorities must have handed him over to the Israelis.

Damra was convicted in June 2004. At his trial, prosecutors showed video footage of Damra and other Muslim leaders raising money for an arm of Islamic Jihad.

He was imam at the Islamic Center of Cleveland. His attorney, Michael Birach, has said Damra was a victim of immigration officials who wanted to look tough after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

Damra immigrated to the United States in the mid-1980s.

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Associated Press writers Mark Lavie in Jerusalem and Kristin Longley in Detroit contributed to this report.