LOS ANGELES — In another striking defeat for the government’s prosecution of Muslim charities, the jury in the Holy Land Foundation trial returned without a single guilty verdict for five defendants accused of indirectly aiding Hamas, a U.S.-designated terrorist organization. The high-profile politically charged case ended in a mistrial on Oct. 22, when two jurors recanted their "not guilty" votes on some of the charges, raising suspicion of illegal jury tampering.

In the original sealed verdict handed down Oct. 18, the jury had found Mufid Abdulqader not guilty on all charges against him. Former Holy Land chairman Mohammed El Mezain and the organization’s New Jersey representative Abdulrahman Odeh were also found innocent on most charges.

The jury had deadlocked on all the charges against defendants Ghassan Elashi and Shukri Abu Baker. But when the verdict was announced on Oct. 22, two jurors shocked the courtroom by indicating they no longer agreed with the acquittal of Abdulqader and Odeh.

According to The Associated Press, the Jury forewoman told the court she was surprised by the position of the two jurors, "When we voted, there was no issue in the vote. No one spoke up any different. I really don’t understand where it’s coming from. All 12 made that decision."

Defendants and attorneys could not comment on the case due to a continuing gag order imposed by the court.

Despite the unanswered question about the two jurors, family members and supporters of the defendants were pleased with the outcome.

"This is a tremendous victory for justice. For the past two months, I’ve felt betrayed by my government. I love my country, and I’m happy to say that the verdict restored my faith in the American justice system," Noor Elashi, the 21 year-old daughter of defendant Ghassan Elashi, said in an interview with InFocus.

Georgetown law professor David Cole, who specializes in First Amendment and terrorism cases, said he believed the outcome of the trial was a "huge defeat" for the government.

"They spent almost 15 years investigating this group, seized all their records and had extensive wiretapping, and yet could not obtain a single conviction on charges of supporting a terrorist organization, " Cole told the Los Angeles Times.

William Neal, one of the jurors on the Holy Land Foundation case, told WFAA News he believed the defendants were innocent based on the evidence presented at the trial.

Neal, 33, whose father worked in military intelligence, also indicated that there were "too many holes" in the prosecution’s case and that it seemed politically driven. "You have an anonymous witness from the Israeli government who told in open court that he is paid to be here. So when you have all these biases, it seems very political to me. I think the problem with this is it has to do with the First Amendment."

Unlike other terrorism cases, the Justice Department never accused Holy Land Foundation or any of its members of plotting or directly funding any acts of violence. Instead, the prosecution contended the defendants contributed money to charities that allegedly were controlled by Hamas, but that were never designated as terrorist groups.

"The zakat committees have not been designated to this day, and yet the government wants to hold these people criminally liable, put them in jail for supporting a group that the government never said you couldn’t support. That’s truly a scary proposition and will have a tremendous chilling effect throughout the charitable communities," Cole told Democracy Now, adding that the government’s prosecution of the case was overstretched and relied heavily on secret evidence.

The Hungry for Justice Coalition, an interfaith organization of civil rights groups, also criticized the prosecution’s use of secret evidence in the trial, claiming the tactic was "unconstitutional."

The coalition further accused the government of using the charges brought against the defendants to block humanitarian aid to Palestinians suffering under Israeli Occupation and to chill the First Amendment rights of American Muslims. "The criminalization of legitimate charitable-giving is not just an attack on the American Muslim community. It is an attack on every American who believes in the moral duty to feed the hungry, clothe the poor and heal the sick," it said.

For other American Muslim leaders, the trial was never about terrorism.

"The case against HLF was a political witch hunt that had nothing to do with America’s security, but carried out to serve the agenda of a special interest group — the Israel Lobby," said Hussam Ayloush, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic relations’ southern California chapter.

The Holy Land Foundation trial was the largest terror-financing case in U.S history and marks the Justice Department’s third failed prosecution of individuals who provided humanitarian assistance in the Occupied Territories.

Two years ago in Florida, a former university professor and two other defendants were found not guilty on charges of sending money to a terrorist group.

More recently, a federal jury in Illinois also acquitted two men of harboring a terror cell and financing violent activities.

Despite the government’s inability to secure a conviction on almost 200 combined indictments, lead prosecutor James Katz told the court the Justice Department intends to retry the case on the charges the jury deadlocked on.

Beth Freed, spokeswoman for the Muslim Legal Fund of America, told InFocus she is not surprised by that decision.

"They don’t need a conviction to achieve their political goal. By relentlessly persecuting these individuals, they are forcing millions of dollars to go into legal defense instead of humanitarian aid, where it belongs.

"The government seeks to disenfranchise American Muslims by tarnishing their image and crippling them with mounting legal fees," she said.

The Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, founded in 1989, was one of the largest Muslim charities in the nation before it was shut down under executive orders in December 2001.

The Bush administration froze millions of dollars in the foundation’s assets without due process, calling the action "another step in the war on terrorism," a contention now challenged with the outcome of the trial.