After leading Fatah al-Islam to kill over 165 of Lebanon's soldiers, terrorist Shaker Abssi was finally sentenced to jail in Jordan. The verdict however had nothing to do with al-Abssi's actions in Lebanon. Al-Abssi and 16 other terrorists were sentenced to jail by a Jordanian military tribunal Wednesday for plotting to join Iraqi insurgents.Abssi, the Palestinian-born leader of the Al-Qaida-inspired Fatah al-Islam group, was among five fugitives given a five-year prison term each by the state security court for their involvement in trying to infiltrate Syria to join Iraq rebels. Another 11 defendants who have been present in court since the trial started in March received jail terms ranging from 20 months to three years, while the remaining suspect was acquitted for lack of evidence.
Abssi was listed in the charge sheet as one of the defendants but no details were given about his role in the case, involving Jordanian suspects seeking to recruit fighters to join Iraq rebels and train them in Syria.
Abssi's fate remains a mystery after conflicting reports that he was killed in northern Lebanon's Nahr al-Bared refugee camp earlier this month at the end of a bloody 15-week standoff between the Lebanese army and his Fatah al-Islam group.
On Monday, Lebanon's attorney general said DNA tests on the body of a man thought to be Abssi had proved negative, and that he may have escaped from the refugee camp. But his wife has insisted that her husband was dead and that she had identified his body at a morgue in Lebanon. "When I first saw him I was shocked by the extent of his wounds, but I knew it was him," Rishdiyeh al-Abssi, 50, told AFP in Beirut in a telephone interview on Tuesday. The 17 defendants sentenced in Jordan had been indicted in February on seven counts, including unlicensed possession and sale of weapons.