Bomb Suspect’s Family Is Confused but Hopeful : Profile: Mohammed Salameh’s relatives saw him change but say they can’t explain his alleged role in attack. They put their trust in U.S. justice.

The day Mohammed A. Salameh went away to the University of Jordan to study Islamic law, his father remembers, he became different.

Before, he said, his son had one interest: “Football. Football. Football,” using the local term for the game of soccer.

Then, he said his son began staying away from the neighborhood soccer games, retreating to his room and memorizing six of the Koran’s 30 chapters.

The young man also grew more regular about his ritual daily prayers. “Before, he used to pray, but sometimes he’d miss his prayers. Now, he didn’t miss his prayers,” said Amin Salameh, a retired Jordanian army lieutenant. “He was quieter, maybe. In fact, very quiet.”

Now, Salameh, 25, is facing charges in the bombing of New York’s World Trade Center, which killed five people and wounded more than 1,000 others.

The Salameh family, residents of a middle-class Amman suburb that has become one of the centers of Islamic fundamentalism in Jordan, finds it impossible to reconcile the idea of the studious young son they sent to work in America six years ago with the image of a terroristthat they see on television. The Salamehs remember a youth who would “go crazy” when his brothers struck his sisters and who spent a large chunk of his monthly college spending money buying chocolates for the family, his father said.

His family, like a growing number of Arabs faced with the massive media coverage of the bombing and its aftermath, are convinced that Salameh, arrested after he attempted to collect a portion of a $400 rental deposit on a van used in the bombing, is a victim--of whom, they’re unsure.

“Can you believe that somebody would go rent a car, report it missing, write his full name and address and then go back to collect the $400? This would be very simplistic to do something like this,” the elder Salameh said. “The American government should really try to find out who did this, without rushing. What President Clinton said is very important: no rushing, no haphazardly bringing in circumstantial evidence like his beard is too long. If they look for the truth 100%, like Clinton said they would do, then they will find Mohammed is 100% innocent.”

At Jordan University’s Sharia College, where Salameh studied, students--young bearded men and veiled women preparing for student council elections in which Islamic groups are expected to again win a majority--also were skeptical.

“Most of us believe that it’s a conspiracy prepared by the Mossad (Israel’s intelligence agency) to create tension between Muslims and Americans,” said Nasser Ahmed, who will take his degree in Islamic studies this year. “They want to show that Islam is not correct, to deviate the American people from the cause of peace.”

Walking through the narrow, dusty streets of the village outside Zarqa where Salameh lived, and sitting in the cramped reception room of his family home, where Koranic verses hang from the walls and there is a tiny ceramic mosque on an end table, it becomes apparent that the international attention paid to this young man--whether or not he is found guilty in connection with the bombing--is simply a spectacular finish to an all-too-typical story in the Middle East.

After he finished high school, his family says, Salameh wanted to study law or English. But because his grades were not good enough, he enrolled in the College of Sharia (Islamic law) on a scholarship for veterans’ children sponsored by Jordan’s royal family.

In 1987, after he finished school, he hoped to become a judge in one of Jordan’s Sharia courts. But when he couldn’t get a job, he decided to go to America to look for work. He surprised his family and received a visa on the same day he applied.

“He said: ‘I’ll go to the States, whether it’s a construction or a garbage collection job, I just want to work,’ ” his father said. “I told him to please stay, but he said: ‘No, you can support me for two or three months, but then what?’ ”

He convinced the man who had sold the family their house to forgo payments for two months and then used that money to buy a plane ticket. He borrowed $300 more from relatives to get started.

It was a sad day when the family took him to the airport, recalled his mother, Aysha, who said: “He didn’t want to go to the States. He felt he would be very lonely there. He was crying. But there is a saying in Arabic: ‘Why would you take something bitter? Because you want to avoid something that is more bitter.’ That’s why he left.”

The family said Mohammed was never specific about the work he was doing in New York. He told them he mostly worked in construction but often took second jobs--at a grocery store, at a bakery.

“He wouldn’t tell me where he was working. I think he was embarrassed to tell me he was getting his hands dirty,” his father said. “I would say: ‘Why are you doing all this work? It’s too hard.’ And he would say: ‘It’s my own sweat. I want to make my own money.’ ”

Mohammed sent $4,000 home--$200 here, $350 there--after he went to the United States. But his family said he never discussed going to radical Muslim Sheik Omar Abdul Rahman’s mosque in New Jersey or associating with any Islamic extremists.

For Mohammed, they said, Islam was always a religion of peace. His mother recalled that he often said the word Islam was related to the Arabic word salaam, or peace.

Ali Ayad Zurbi, a neighbor, said that when some young neighborhood toughs joined Palestinian activist groups to mount attacks on Israel, Mohammed “always refused to join. He said that those who do those sorts of things are a mob, irrational,” he said.

The family learned of Mohammed’s fate after television reports identified a suspect in the bombing as a young Jordanian from the West Bank village of Biddiya.

Now they are left to sort out the truth of what happened, and to wonder when, if ever, Mohammed will come home.

Profiles of Bombing Suspects

Here is some background on the three suspects held in connection with the bombing of the World Trade Center. Elgabrowny’s photo is not available. All are being held without bail:

Mohammed A. Salameh, 25

Arrested: March 4

Palestinian holding a Jordanian passport. The first to be apprehended in the case. Accused of “aiding and abetting” in the attack. He was arrested in Jersey City, N.J., after he tried to get back his $400 deposit on the rental van that authorities say was used to take the bomb to the underground garage.

Ibrahim A. Elgabrowny, 42

Arrested: March 4

Egyptian-born carpenter. Arrested outside his home in Brooklyn when he hit two federal agents who had come to search his apartment. He is charged with obstruction of justice. At arraignment, prosecutors say he was also a suspect in the bombing.

Nidal Ayyad, 25

Arrested: Wednesday

Chemical engineer with AlliedSignal Inc. He is charged with “aiding and abetting” the attack. Authorities believe he manufactured the bomb.