CLEVELAND -- An Islamic meeting that took place in Cleveland is believed to be tied to the insurgency in Iraq.

Officials said two Chicago men came to northeast Ohio to learn how to kill U.S. troops.

From making roadside bombs to constructing the vest worn by suicide bombers, the agenda of the meeting in July 2004 was terror, reported NewsChannel5's Curtis Jackson.

Thousands of Muslims from across the country gathered in Cleveland that weekend for a meeting that was meant to raise awareness of issues affecting their community and help heal the emotional wounds of the Sept. 11 terror attacks.

But officials said the event unknowingly because a rendezvous point for terrorists.

"Obviously a legitimate meeting was in some essence co-opted by terrorist groups and used not only to recruit but also to set up the training," said NewsChannel5 terrorism expert Al McGinty.

Federal prosecutors said Khaleel Ahmed and his cousin, Zubair Ahmed, came to Cleveland to meet a man referred to in the indictment as "the trainer."

According to officials, the men's goal was to learn how to make suicide bomb vests and improvised explosive devices to kill U.S. troops in Iraq.

The Ahmeds were introduced to the trainer by Marwan el Hindi, one of three U.S. citizens living in Toledo accused of plotting terror attacks in the U.S. and abroad, prosecutors said.

The Ahmeds are also U.S. citizens from Chicago.

"This shows, I think, that there is quite an alarming level of support in these communities for anti-American actions," McGinty said.

McGinty said arrests of Islamic-Americans trigger worse fears of homegrown terrorism in the U.S.

"Sooner or later, there will be an attack again in America, and our goal is to stop these in the early stages rather than let them go too far," he said.

Federal investigators were able to derail the plot with the help of the man known as "the trainer," who is an FBI informant and an Islamic Gulf War veteran.