Christians Under Attack

June 4, 2007 -- A remote Muslim commune nestled in the Catskill Mountains has come under the scrutiny of state and federal authorities for possible ties to terrorism, according to law-enforcement sources.

Officials say Islamberg - a wooded, 70-acre encampment in upstate Tompkins, about three hours north of the city - acts as the headquarters for an outfit called Muslims of the Americas, widely believed to be a front for Jamaat al-Fuqra, founded by radical Pakistani cleric Mubarak Ali Gilani.

Reports of gunfire and military-style physical training at the camp have led some investigators to believe that the group's members are preparing for homegrown jihad.

According to one account, a neighbor said he has seen commune members dressed in Port Authority uniforms.

Al-Fuqra members have been suspects in assassinations and firebombings in the United States, authorities said, and an associate of the group, Rodney Hampton-el, was jailed in 1996 for plotting to bomb New York bridges and tunnels.

Gilani is the extremist who Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl was reportedly trying to meet in Pakistan when he was abducted and beheaded.

Gilani started the organization in 1980, when he came to America and began preaching at a Brooklyn mosque.

After Gilani returned to Pakistan, the American group he started entrenched itself in a number of rural outposts, according to authorities.

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The feds have alleged that some group members have been sent to Pakistan and Afghanistan to receive terrorist training.

One Islamberg resident denied the charge.

"This is my country," the resident said. "I love this country. I did a year in the bush in Vietnam for this country."

The resident, who wouldn't give his name, was wearing traditional Islamic garb when he intercepted a Post reporter seeking a tour of the camp.

The camp, which sits off a dirt road, appears to be little more than a collection of ramshackle homes and trailers.

The resident admitted that Gilani was the spiritual head of Muslims of the Americas but denied the existence of al-Fuqra.

The resident called Gilani "a reformer."

"But some people don't reform," he said. "They do a lot of foolishness in [Gilani's] name."

Asked whether commune members kept weapons at the camp, the resident said, "We got guns up here just like everyone else got guns. We're American citizens."

john.mazor@nypost.com