An article in today’s FrontPage Magazine, “Hometown Jihad: The School Gym that Terror Built”, reports that Sunrise Academy in Hilliard, the only full-time Islamic school in Central Ohio, has twice used Siraj Wahhaj, an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and close personal friend of “Blind Shiekh” Omar Abdel-Rahman, for fundraisers for the school. Abdel-Rahman was convicted of “seditious conspiracy” and given a life sentence for his role in the 1993 WTC bombing, and Wahhaj appeared in court as a character witness for Abdel-Rahman’s defense.
In March 2006, Wahhaj was brought in to help raise funds for Sunrise Academy’s new sports complex, an event that was held at the Makoy Center in Hilliard (coincidentally, the same facility visited in November 2006 by First Lady Laura Bush for a fundraiser for Cong. Deborah Pryce). That fundraiser was apparently so successful that Wahhaj was brought in again by Sunrise Academy this past February to raise money for the school.
As the article this morning notes, this is not the first time that Wahhaj has been used by a Central Ohio organization for fundraising purposes. Back in March, it was reported (“CAIR’s Blood Money”) that CAIR-Ohio brought Wahhaj in June 2006 for another fundraiser, where he raised $100,000 for the “civil rights” organization, as noted in a CAIR press release.
Today’s article offers quotes by Wahhaj to give readers an idea of Wahhaj’s positions. In one he calls for Muslims to takeover America:
“[I]f only Muslims were clever politically, they could take over the United States and replace its constitutional government with a caliphate. If we were united and strong, we would elect our own emir and give allegiance to him. Take my word if eight million Muslims unite in America, the country will come to us.”In another, he outlines his vision for an Islamic supremacist society:
“I have a vision in America, Muslims owning property all over, Muslim businesses, factories, halal meat, supermarkets, all these buildings owned by Muslims. Can you see the vision, can you see the Newark International Airport and a John Kennedy Airport and La Guardia having Muslim fleets of planes, Muslim pilots. Can you see our trucks rolling down the highways, Muslim names. Can you imagine walking down the streets of Teaneck, [New Jersey]: three Muslim high schools, five Muslim junior-high schools, fifteen public schools. Can you see the vision, can you see young women walking down the street of Newark, New Jersey, with long flowing hijab and long dresses. Can you see the vision of an area . . . controlled by the Muslims?”Paul Barrett, an editor for Business Week and author of the recent book, American Islam: Struggle for the Soul of Religion, explains the kind of justice that would be administered in Wahhaj’s Islamic America:
He has told his followers that a society governed by strict Islamic law, in which adulterers would be stoned to death and thieves would have their hands cut off, would be superior to American democracy.And having spent significant amounts of time with Wahhaj, Barrett describes how he rises to the defense of Osama bin Laden, saying that he wants to remain neutral on bin Laden’s involvement in 9/11:
He says the al-Qaeda leader’s videotaped boasting about the attacks may have been a media ruse: “I’m just not so sure I want to be one of the ones who say, ‘Yeah, he did it. He’s a horrible man.’”Surely Sunrise Academy will claim that this is nothing but “guilt by association”, but is their position really defensible? Wahhaj’s extremist public statements and his associations and public defense of convicted terrorists are well known. Sunrise Academy can’t claim that they weren’t aware. And yet they publicly chose not only to voluntarily associate with Wahhaj, but they brought him in to represent their organization for fundraising purposes.
Let’s not forget that Sunrise Academy was also the operational hub of Hilliard resident and Muslim Brotherhood operative Salah Sultan (see our recent post, “The Hilliard-HAMAS-Muslim Brotherhood Connection”). Sunrise Academy has many associations they should feel guilty about.
Today’s article promises more explosive revelations about the extensive network of Islamic radicalism in Central Ohio, which apparently extend into the corridors of political power. We can’t wait to see what those articles reveal.
