Muhammad Salah, acquitted of supporting Hamas, dead at 62

CHICAGO (AP) - A suburban Chicago man who fought off charges that he supported Hamas has died of complications from cancer. Muhammad Salah was 62.

A spokesman for the Mosque Foundation in Bridgeview said Salah died early Sunday.

Salah was a Palestinian native and U.S. citizen. The Treasury Department classified him as a "specially designated terrorist" in the 1990s. He pleaded guilty in Israel to providing funding to Hamas extremists, but his lawyers said his confession was coerced by sleep deprivation and abuse. He claimed that $97,400 he was carrying with him was for humanitarian purposes. He was released in 1997.

In 2007, Salah faced terrorism charges in the U.S. He was acquitted of racketeering conspiracy but convicted of obstruction for lying about a fatal Hamas shooting of an American teenager in Israel.

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