The BBC’s Panorama program on Monday, “Muslim First, British Second,” addressed the growing problem of Islamic radicalization flourishing under the guise of “non-violent” Muslims. What they discovered is that extremist preachers, while nominally disclaiming violence, in fact, are a major contributor to the atmosphere of hate that breeds Islamic terrorism.
So it was no surprise then that one of the hatemongers they profiled was none other than Khalid Yasin, who was in Ohio last year conducting fundraisers in Columbus and Dayton. As we reported here exclusively at COAT last May, Yasin spent more than a week touring a number of Columbus-area mosques and Ohio State, his visit sponsored by the Islamic Society of Greater Columbus.
The segment on Khalid Yasin begins around the 9:40 mark:
Sure is nice to see a major media outlet addressing this problem — even if they are 3,866 miles away. Now if only get the media a little closer to home to begin seriously tackling this issue. Not holding my breath.
Thanks to Dirk Thompson of 610AM WTVN for having me on his program yesterday to discuss this top 10 list. Dirk’s program page is here, and the MP3 audio for the program can be found here.
For some background on the terrorist network in the Columbus area, see the CBN News report, “Jihad in Central Ohio”. Also check out our 2007 Top 10 list.
1) Columbus Al-Qaeda cell member Christopher Paul pleads guilty (June 2008)
On June 2nd, we reported that Columbus Al-Qaeda cell member Christopher Paul had agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction against Americans overseas. He has not be sentenced yet, but could face up to 20 years. His co-conspirators Iyman Faris and Nuradin Abdi have already pled guilty and are currently serving their respective prison sentences. The indictments in this case indicate that there are at least 10 additional Al-Qaeda cell members who have not yet been charged, with at least one deported and several others fleeing the country. Others, however, are still operating within the community. The Columbus Al-Qaeda cell is the largest known cell found inside the US since 9/11.
We also reproduced the statement of facts released by the Department of Justice which details exactly what Christopher Paul has admitted to. The statement of facts reveals that not only did Paul, a Worthington High School graduate, travel to Afghanistan in the early 1990s to train in terror camps, he returned to Columbus with the intent to build and train his own terror cell. The recruitment and training occurred primarily at the Omar Ibn El Khattab mosque just north of the OSU campus, where Paul was a leader and regularly taught martial arts classes. He also conducted firearms training at Burr Oak State Park. Paul also admitted that he assisted and sent funds to a German-based terror cell, run by a known Al-Qaeda operative, and traveled there to conduct explosives training that he knew would be used in attacks targeting Americans overseas.
Despite Christopher Paul’s confession, local Muslim leaders, including Basil Mohamed Gohar, continued to protest Paul’s innocence. As CBN News reporter Erick Stakelbeck observed, “Columbus Al-Qaeda Man Charged, CAIR not pleased”, Central Ohio Islamic leaders had been protesting Paul’s innocence ever since his arrest, most particularly CAIR national vice-chairman and Paul associate, Ahmad Al-Akhras.
Here’s a video news report on Paul’s guilty plea by reporter Maureen Kocot courtesy of 10TV CBS News
2) Toledo Terror Trio convicted on all counts (June 2008)
No sooner had the ink dried on Christopher Paul’s plea agreement than the jury in the terrorism trial of three Toledo men, Mohammad Amawi, Marwan El-Hindi, and Wassim Mazloum, returned guilty verdicts on all charges against the men of plotting to kill US soldiers overseas and recruiting others to wage jihad. Amawi and El-Hindi were also convicted of distributing information regarding explosives to terrorists.
The Department of Justice press release on the jury’s guilty verdicts details the Toledo Terror Trio’s activities:
At trial, the government proved that all three defendants engaged in a conspiracy, beginning sometime prior to June 2004, to kill or maim persons outside the United States, including U.S. armed forces personnel in Iraq. As part of the conspiracy, the defendants conducted firearms training and accessed and copied instructions in the construction and use of explosives – including IEDs and suicide bomb vests. In addition, the defendants conspired to recruit others to participate in jihad training; researched and solicited funding sources for such training; and proposed sites for training in firearms, explosives and hand-to-hand combat to prospective recruits.
The government also proved that all defendants conspired to provide material support and resources, including personnel, money, explosives and laptop computers, to terrorists, including a co-conspirator in the Middle East, who had requested such materials for use against U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq. For example, among other activities, Amawi communicated with a contact in the Middle East on chemical explosives and traveled to Jordan in August 2005 with laptop computers intended for delivery for mujahideen “brothers” whom he learned were preparing to cross into Iraq.
The government also proved that Amawi knowingly distributed to others a guide describing the step-by-step process for manufacturing chemical explosive compounds, as well as a video entitled Martyrdom Operation Vest Preparation, which described the step-by-step construction and use of a suicide bomb vest. Amawi distributed these materials with the intent that they be used for training others to commit a crime of violence, including the killing of U.S. nationals overseas.
The government further proved that El-Hindi knowingly distributed a slide show demonstrating the preparation and use of IEDs against apparent U.S. military vehicles and personnel, as well as the video entitled Martyrdom Operation Vest Preparation. El-Hindi distributed these materials with the intent that they be used for training others to commit a crime of violence, including the killing of U.S. nationals overseas.
Later that month, CBS News correspondent Bob Orr (a former Columbus resident) reported that the Toledo Terror Trio was in contact with active terrorism cells in Chicago, Atlanta, Toronto, and an Al-Qaeda webmaster in London. Two members of the Chicago cell are awaiting trial. Here is Orr’s report:
The terror trio are still awaiting sentencing. Here is a video on the guilty verdicts courtesy of WTOL-11 Toledo.
3) Holy Land Foundation terror finance convictions and the Ohio HLF fundraisers and HAMAS support network (November 2008)
On November 24th, a Dallas federal jury in the terrorism finance trial of six Holy Land Foundation officials returned guilty verdicts on all 108 counts. The HLF officials were found guilty of funneling $12 million to the terrorist organization, HAMAS.
Two important Ohio-related developments came out of the HLF trial.
The first was that HLF maintained at least one chapter in Cleveland, and fundraisers for the group were also held in mosques around the state. In July 2004 (and in a subsequent August 2004 report) Cleveland Plain Dealer investigative reporter Amanda Garrett detailed some of HLF’s activities in Cleveland just months before the federal government designated HLF as a terror finance entity and froze the group’s assets:
Between 1992 and 2001, the Texas-based charity raked in more than $57 million in contributions, gifts and grants and since 1995 moved at least $12.4 million of that into the Palestinian terror group’s coffers, the indictment said.
Money donated by Cleveland Muslims was likely part of the case flow.
Three years ago, when the federal government froze Holy Land’s assets, the FBI said hundreds of Cleveland Muslims attended at least two fund-raisers for the charity in April 2001.
“If we are Hamas, so what? We are helping out people,”an FBI informant quoted an unnamed speaker as saying during one of the Cleveland fund-raisers.
How many Holy Land fund-raisers were Cleveland-based or how much money was raised is unclear. But the former president of the Texas-based foundation — Shukri Abu Baker — has said his group has relationships with at least 600 mosques, including the Islamic Center of Cleveland, which is in Parma. (Amanda Garrett, “Feds link Muslim Charity to Hamas, Cleveland chapter arranged fund-raisers,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, July 28, 2004; see also Amanda Garrett, “Investigation links bank account in Cleveland to terror activity,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, August 24, 2004)
The second Ohio-related development that came out of the case is that documents entered into evidence in the case revealed the extensive HAMAS/Muslim Brotherhood support network operating in the US, which involves many prominent American Islamic organizations. Some of these organizations, including the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), which operates 3 chapters in Ohio (Cincinnati, Columbus, and Cleveland) in addition to a state chapter, and the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), which hosted it’s 2008 national convention in downtown Columbus back in August, have committed themselves to a program of “Civilizational-Jihadist Process” dedicated to waging “a grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within”, according to one trial document entered into evidence.
Dallas News columnist Rod Dreher explains the implications of these trial documents and what they reveal about these Islamic organizations:
The HLF trial is exposing for the first time how the international Muslim Brotherhood — whose Palestinian division is Hamas — operates as a self-conscious revolutionary vanguard in the United States. The court documents indicate that many leading Muslim-American organizations — including the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and the Muslim American Society — are an integral part of the Brotherhood’s efforts to wage jihad against America by nonviolent means. . .
According to a 2004 Chicago Tribune investigation, establishing the Brotherhood in the United States has been a 40-year project that has worked mostly underground — even beneath the notice of many Muslims. Richard Clarke, the former top U.S. national security official, told the Senate in 2003 that the Muslim Brotherhood is the common thread linking terrorist fundraising schemes in the United States — which likely explains why so many mainstream American Muslim organizations were named by the feds as “unindicted co-conspirators” in the HLF trial.
Is this just alarmist paranoia? Not at all.
This matters because high-profile organizations with roots explicitly in the Muslim Brotherhood have successfully established themselves in a paramount position to define Islam in America according to a radical politicized model. And they’ve done so without the American public having the slightest idea about their real agenda. (“What the Muslim Brotherhood Means to the U.S: Memo lays bare group’s plan to destroy U.S. from within”, Dallas Morning News, September 9, 2007)
In Ohio, many of our government and political leaders continue to work with and assist these organizations who admit to waging non-violent jihad in the US. In 2007, I reported on Gov. Ted Strickland’s appearance at the annual CAIR-OH banquet just days after the organization had been named unindicted co-conspirator in the HLF trial.
CBN News reported on the HLF guilty verdicts:
After the HLF trial and the guilty verdicts, an important video was released by the Investigative Project on Terrorism (IPT), which includes video taken from HLF videos of their fundraisers advocating terrorism:
4) HAMAS terror labs funded and built by Dublin, Ohio-based, Arab Student Aid International bombed by IDF (December 2008)
A last-minute entry for our 2008 Top 10 list involves the Dublin/Hilliard-based Arab Student Aid International (ASAI). Last Monday, December 29th, the Israeli Air Force bombed terrorist labs located at the HAMAS-controlled Islamic University of Gaza.
Thus far unreported is that the IUG science and technology lab was financed and constructed with the assistance of the Dublin, Ohio-based Arab Student Aid International (ASAI). In fact, the IUG website has a page dedicated to ASAI’s ongoing contributions to the Hamas institution and specifically mentions the labs financed by the Ohio Islamic group. Additionally, the ASAI website promotes its assistance in creating the IUG science and technology center, which was completed in 2002.
In a previously published article I revealed ASAI’s extensive financial ties to the IUG, including direct cash payments to the Hamas school in addition to the facilities construction projects supported by ASAI. The Washington Post also revealed in April 2006 that ASAI had financed the Western education of a number of top Hamas leaders.
The organization’s primary benefactor is Prince Turki Ben Abdul Aziz, a former high-ranking Saudi government official and half-brother to King Abdullah. Prince Turki has lived in exile in Egypt since the 1970s following a highly publicized marriage scandal, his 100+ entourage occupying the top three floors of the Cairo Ramses Hilton. The prince serves as ASAI’s chairman of the board, and the labs built by ASAI at the IUG bear his name.
In 2005, Congress passed a law prohibiting USAID from providing any funding or assistance to IUG because it is controlled by HAMAS. During congressional hearings on the matter, former House Foreign Affairs chairman Rep. Tom Lantos told USAID Director Tobias, “Providing U.S. assistance to a terrorist-controlled university in Gaza was out of the question and, in fact, violates U.S. law.” He added, “This outrageous support for terrorism must and will end.”
Unfortunately, until federal law enforcement authorities put a stop to ASAI’s support of HAMAS will undoubtedly continue.
5) FBI investigates Columbus Somalis leaving US for jihad (November–December)
A number of local and national media reports have appeared in recent weeks about current FBI investigations in a number of US cities regarding Somali men who are leaving the country and returning to Somalia to train in terror camps and waging jihad with the Al-Shabaab terrorist group. FBI officials in Columbus are looking into possible departures in our area, which hosts the second largest Somali community in the US.
The funeral for Shirwa Ahmed last week in Burnsville, Minnesota, punctuated a growing national security threat metastasizing inside the U.S. — one Homeland Security and law enforcement authorities have quickly taken note of. Ahmed, who killed himself in a suicide bombing attack in Somalia in October, is just one of up to 40 men from the Twin Cities area who have disappeared and are feared to have returned to their homeland for training with the al-Shabaab terrorist group to wage jihad.
The FBI is investigating similar disappearances in other major Somali communities in Columbus, OH, Atlanta, Boston, San Diego, and Seattle. There are even reports coming from Europe, recently from Denmark, of Somali men returning home to fight with al-Shabaab and other terrorist organizations.
ABC News also reports that a Somali from Boston, Tarek Mehenna, a U.S. citizen, was arrested last month on his way to Somalia to wage jihad after being in contact with Daniel Maldonado, a Muslim convert currently in federal prison after pleading guilty to training at a Somali terror training camp after being captured in Kenya with a Somali terrorist cell. . .
So why are authorities suddenly concerned?
In the past year developments within the Somali terrorist organizations have resulted in splits and fractionalization, with the most radical element, al-Shabaab, the former armed wing of the Islamic Courts Union movement, breaking away and forging closer alliances with al-Qaeda. As a result, Somalia is quickly becoming a new safe haven for al-Qaeda. Al-Shabaab and its leaders were designated a terrorist organization by the State Department back in March.
The most specific concern of Homeland Security officials about the departure of Somalis and other American Muslims for the terror training camps in Somalia is not that they will be killed, as was Minneapolis suicide bomber Shirwa Ahmed, but that they will get trained in the Somali terrorist camps and return home to wage jihad against the U.S. from within.
And al-Shabaab has made clear its intent to attack the U.S. and kill Americans.
Predictably, the Columbus Dispatchstumbled onto the story quoting local Somali leaders and FBI officials claiming ignorance of any local connections of the local Somali community to terrorism.
Apparently Dispatch reporter Sherri Williams doesn’t bother to read her own paper. She might consult her colleague Jodi Andes August 7, 2007 report, “Somali Man Pleads Guilty to Plot”, where she might discover that Columbus Al-Qaeda cell member and Columbus Somali Nuradin Abdi admitted to traveling to Somali terror training camps in the ethnic Somali areas of Ogaden, Ethoipia. So we already have a documented case of one Columbus Somali man linked to international terrorism.
Apparently the Dispatch will exclude any evidence — even its own!!! — to grind their pro-jihadist agenda.
Here is a video report on the case of the missing Somali men by Twin Cities Fox 9:
6) Hilliard cleric Salah Sultan appears on Egyptian TV threatening the US and preaching Jew hatred (December 2008)
Again, another late entry for our 2008 Top 10 list. Last Monday, Hilliard cleric Salah Sultan appeared on Egyptian Al-Nas TV, where he delivered a diatribe threatening the US and spewing vile anti-Jewish hate that was videotaped and translated by the indispensable Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI).
Egyptian cleric Dr. Salah Sultan: The arch-murderer who commanded the campaign against Jenin in 2003 went to America a few months later and boarded a NASA space shuttle. The space shuttle was launched by NASA, and a few minutes later, it reached Texas, the land of President Bush. Then this space shuttle shattered to pieces, along with the five top American space scientists, and that commander of the Zionist airforce was on board with them. Where exactly did it shatter and fall? By Allah, Sheik Mahmoud, although I was living in America, I didn’t know that there was a city called “Palestine” in America. Sheik Mustafa, the space shuttle fell, of all places, in the city of Palestine, in President Bush’s state of Texas.
[ . . . ]
The stone, which is thrown at the Jews, hates these Jews, these Zionists, because Allah foretold, via His Prophet Muhammad, that Judgment Day will not come before the Jew and the Muslim fight. The Jew will hide behind stones and trees, and the stone and the tree will speak, saying: “Oh Muslim, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.” The only exception will be the Gharqad tree.
TV host: The Jews know this for sure, that’s why they plant Gharqad trees.
Dr. Salah Sultan: The stone’s self-awareness is such that it can distinguish Muslims from Jews.
TV host: True, and it will support the Muslims.
[ . . . ]
Dr. Salah Sultan: American, which gave [Israel] everything it needed in these battles, will suffer economic stagnation, ruin, destruction, and crime, which will surpass what is happening in Gaza. One of these days, the U.S. will suffer more deaths than all those killed in this third Gaza holocaust. This will happen soon.
[ . . . ]
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion is an attempt to rule and corrupt the entire world. When the world concentrates on its desires and lusts, the [Jews] will be free to implement their plan of controlling the world.
Yasin claims that AIDS was invented at a US government lab and spread by Western governments through UN agencies and Christian missionaries. (“Khalid Yasin: The New Voice of Islam?” Sunday, October 9, 2005)
Yasin justified the terrorist bombings in Bali because of years of alleged Western oppression. (“Khalid Yasin: The New Voice of Islam?” Sunday, October 9, 2005)
Yasin rejects any separation between Islam and the state and openly advocates for the reestablishment of the caliphate. (Sunday Nights with John Cleary, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, September 7, 2003)
Yasin visited Jemaah Islamiah terrorist leader Abu Bakar Bashir in prison. (“Koranic TV next step for radial sheikh”, Sydney Morning Herald, August 20, 2005)
Yasin was in Saudi Arabia on 9/11 soliciting support from the Al-Qaeda front Al-Haramain Foundation, which was designated a terrorist organization in 2004 by the US government, to help finance his Islamic Broadcasting Company.
It is difficult to overstate the hatred, bigotry, misogyny and malicious conspiracy theories spewed by Khalid Yasin. That notwithstanding, in Columbus Yasin appeared at Masjid Omar Ibn El Khattab, Masjid Ibn Taymiyya, the Abubaker Siddique Islamic Center, Masjid Oumar Al-Foutiyou, and a special appearance at Ohio State.
So despicable is his warped Islamic ideology that he had been made a pariah by the international media. In 2005, Australian NSW Premier Bob Carr condemned Yasin’s views, which no doubt led to Yasin being banned from Australia. Statements made on his DVDs were featured in the UK Channel 4 “Undercover Mosque” program, which were found available for sale in British mosques.
When Dayton TV station WDTN interviewed leaders for Masjid at-Taqwa about Yasin’s documented extremist views, they defended the hate sheikh:
But not everyone was thrilled about Khalid Yasin coming to Ohio, and I later reported on Muslims who began speaking out and expressing grave concerns about Yasin’s long history of fraudulent fundraising and the complicity of so-called Muslim “leaders” who look the other way at his fraud (“Did Hate Sheikh Khalid Yasin Defraud Ohio Muslims”):
One source speaking out about Khalid Yasin’s fraudulent fundraising is the Salafi Burnout blog, which has alleged that the hate sheikh is enriching himself in a series of scams preying on the American Muslim community:
Having been exposed as a fraud in Australia and the UK, Khalid Yasin is currently back in the United States still peddling his television scam and raising money and taking up to half the money as his personal cut. He has also raised money in Saudi Arabia and other Muslim countries for a supposed Qur’an Memorization School in Alabama that did not exist. Last report, he was taking this money and investing it in real estate in Long Island in his own name. Should Muslims continue to allow this individual to trade on his name and swindle his community out of hundreds of thousands of dollars?
These sentiments have been echoed by Abdur-Rahman Muhammad, who praised Salafi Burnout for publicly challenging Yasin and questioning how the American Muslim community has allowed a con man to operate so wantonly in their midst without the slightest criticism from Muslim leaders until now:
By now almost everyone is caught up in the buzz swirling around recent revelations of “Sheikh” Khalid Yasin’s long history of fraud and deceit. I applaud the courageous blog Salafi Burnout for attempting to protect the Muslims from what can only be described as a criminal enterprise, and to make us all aware of the tremendous damage it has caused to the community. As Yasin’s criminal house of cards appears to finally be falling, we are left with many unanswered questions as to why this kind of thing has been allowed to go on for so long.
Let there be no mistake, other shoes will drop, not only on Khalid Yasin but a whole host of other “du’ aat” and Imams who have with impunity betrayed the trust of the Muslims, and have left us wondering how individuals with such shady and dubious backgrounds were allowed to attain such stature, influence, and respectability in the first place. It is no exaggeration to say, as we shall soon learn, that our community is top heavy with these types of scoundrels, and yet the larger question remains; why did so many responsible and affluent Muslims fork over huge sums of money to a man who spouts the kind of absurd, preposterous, indeed psychotic things that he does?
Others have also expressed outrage that while Yasin has taken home as much as a hundred thousands dollars in an evening, thanks to his usual 50/50 split of all funds raised at an event, his wife and child live on public welfare in their home in Sheffield, England.
8) Cleveland’s New Terror Imam (July 2008)
In a July 9th article for Pajamas Media, I introduce the new imam of the Islamic Center of Cleveland, Sayed Abouabdalla, the third such successor since Fawaz Damra was deported in January 2007 after being convicted of lying about his association with three terrorist groups on his US citizenship application. Abouabdalla’s most immediate predecessor was Ahmad Alzaree, who resigned his position three days before he was scheduled to start due to the revelations by Tom Blumer of BizzyBlog and myself about Alzaree’s extremist statements.
In my article about Abouabdalla’s hiring I strongly criticize the Cleveland Plain Dealer’s kid-glove treatment of Abouabdalla and their failure to report on his ties to terror — a glaring omission considering the crimes by his predecessor Damra that created the vacancy at the Islamic Center of Cleveland in the first place:
One element in the Plain Dealer’s recent coverage of Abouabdalla’s background that passes without the slightest bit of apparent investigation is the fact that he continues to serve as a faculty member of the Islamic American University (IAU) in Dearborn, Michigan. Of the 19 courses offered by IAU this summer term, Abouabdalla teaches 14 of them.
IAU is a project of the Muslim American Society (MAS), an organization federal prosecutors just recently identified in a federal appeals court brief as being “founded as the overt arm of the Muslim Brotherhood in the United States.” The Muslim Brotherhood has been the breeding ground for virtually every single Islamic terrorist group in the world, and the vast majority of al-Qaeda’s leadership has come through its ranks.
The MAS/Muslim Brotherhood association is just the beginning of IAU’s ties to terror. The honorary chairman of the IAU board of trustees is none other than Hamas spiritual leader Yousef al-Qaradawi — a fact acknowledged on the MAS website — who has been banned from the U.S. since 1999 for his open support of terrorist activities.
Not only has Qaradawi repeatedly issued fatwas defending the use of suicide bombings, but in August 2004 he co-signed a letter with the leaders of both Hezbollah and Hamas calling for al-Qaeda-backed insurgents in Iraq to “purify the land of Islam from the filth of occupation,” meaning U.S. military forces. He has said that “those who die fighting U.S. occupation forces are martyrs,” and he also recently defended the use of women as suicide bombers. Rightly so, the Anti-Defamation League has described Qaradawi as the “theologian of terror.”
Abouabdalla has also served on the Fiqh Council of North America as recently as last summer — an association that the Plain Dealer makes absolutely no mention of. For good reason, it seems, as the Fiqh Council is a “Who’s Who” of convicted terrorist leaders, terrorist fundraisers, unindicted co-conspirators, and terrorist associates. One former member, Abdurahman Alamoudi, is serving a 23-year prison sentence on terrorism charges for working with Libyan intelligence to assassinate the Saudi crown prince. Another former Fiqh Council member? Fawaz Damra.
9) Jihadists place $50,000 bounty on Columbus Pastor Rod Parsley’s head in terrorist online forum (September 2008)
No doubt inspired by an extensive PR campaign last year by CAIR, some jihadists posted a $50,000 bounty on the head of World Harvest Pastor Rod Parsley of Columbus on the Ekhlass online jihadist forum. The story was first reported by the Northeast Intelligence Network. In my own post on the topic, I provide a machine translation of the death threat.
10) Friend-of-HAMAS Mary Jo Kilroy elected to Congress from Ohio 15th District (November 2008)
(For an updated caveat to this entry, see this post)
During the 2008 election season, I reported on the efforts of our local HAMAS support group, CAIR, to get Democrat Mary Jo Kilroy elected to Congress. Not only were CAIR officials promoting Kilroy’s candidacy by hosting events at their headquarters featuring Kilroy, but CAIR officials opened up their wallets to fund her campaign. Federal campaign finance reports also give evidence that CAIR officials, including Kilroy’s pal, CAIR vice chairman Ahmad Al-Akhras, bundled cash for Kilroy.
But when Kilroy was announced the winner in the Ohio 15th race, narrowly beating Steve Stivers, Al-Akhras could hardly contain his glee at having a friend of HAMAS going to Washington DC on their behalf. He expressed his delight in a December 7th email circulated in the Columbus Muslim community:
Salam to all — Mary Jo Kilroy is the Congresswoman for the 15th District.
Mary Jo won the 15th District by 2311 votes and Steve Stivers just conceded. This is good news.
Ahmad
So as HAMAS continues to rain down rockets on innocent Israeli civilians from Gaza as the current crisis in the Middle East escalates, no doubt HAMAS leaders and their US-based stooges are glad to know that one of their own will be sworn into the House of Representatives this week.
That’s all for 2008! No doubt we will have plenty more to report on in 2009! We’ll be back next year at the same bat-time, same bat-channel!
In May I reported here that international hate sheikh Khalid Yasin was making an appearance in Dayton sponsored by Masjid At-Taqwa and a weeklong schedule of events in Islamic Society of Greater Columbus mosques, in addition to an event at Ohio State (flier for the OSU event below).
But as I write in FrontPage today, “Khalid Yasin: Hate Sheikh, Con Man?”, some Muslims are speaking out and expressing grave concerns about Yasin’s long history of fraudulent fundraising and the complicity of so-called Muslim “leaders” who look the other way at his fraud:
But the issue raising concerns amongst some Muslim leaders in the US is not just Yasin’s cross-country tours promoting his toxic blend of rancid theology and conspiracy-mongering, but also about his fraudulent fundraising and questionable business practices. These Muslim leaders are also concerned that some Islamic institutions have willing looked the other way and ignored these scams as long as Yasin continues to regularly rake in substantial sums on their behalf.
Others have also expressed outrage that while Yasin has taken home as much as a hundred thousands dollars in an evening, thanks to his usual 50/50 split of all funds raised at an event, his wife and child live on public welfare in their home in Sheffield, England.
One source speaking out about Khalid Yasin’s fraudulent fundraising is the Salafi Burnout blog, which has alleged that the hate sheikh is enriching himself in a series of scams preying on the American Muslim community:
Having been exposed as a fraud in Australia and the UK, Khalid Yasin is currently back in the United States still peddling his television scam and raising money and taking up to half the money as his personal cut. He has also raised money in Saudi Arabia and other Muslim countries for a supposed Qur’an Memorization School in Alabama that did not exist. Last report, he was taking this money and investing it in real estate in Long Island in his own name. Should Muslims continue to allow this individual to trade on his name and swindle his community out of hundreds of thousands of dollars?
These sentiments have been echoed by Abdur-Rahman Muhammad, who praised Salafi Burnout for publicly challenging Yasin and questioning how the American Muslim community has allowed a con man to operate so wantonly in their midst without the slightest criticism from Muslim leaders until now:
By now almost everyone is caught up in the buzz swirling around recent revelations of “Sheikh” Khalid Yasin’s long history of fraud and deceit. I applaud the courageous blog Salafi Burnout for attempting to protect the Muslims from what can only be described as a criminal enterprise, and to make us all aware of the tremendous damage it has caused to the community. As Yasin’s criminal house of cards appears to finally be falling, we are left with many unanswered questions as to why this kind of thing has been allowed to go on for so long.
Let there be no mistake, other shoes will drop, not only on Khalid Yasin but a whole host of other “du’ aat” and Imams who have with impunity betrayed the trust of the Muslims, and have left us wondering how individuals with such shady and dubious backgrounds were allowed to attain such stature, influence, and respectability in the first place. It is no exaggeration to say, as we shall soon learn, that our community is top heavy with these types of scoundrels, and yet the larger question remains; why did so many responsible and affluent Muslims fork over huge sums of money to a man who spouts the kind of absurd, preposterous, indeed psychotic things that he does?
As I reported previously, this is far from the first time that allegations of fraud and deception have dogged Khalid Yasin. When investigators for the Australian Sunday program looked into his academic background and his media company, the Islamic Broadcasting Corporation, back in 2005 they found a pattern of rampant fraud, deliberate misrepresentations, a mountain unpaid debts by Yasin, and unanswered questions about his phony academic credentials:
Exit question: Were ISGC leaders (such as Mohammad Tarazi) aware of Khalid Yasin’s history of fraudulent fundraising before they invited him to into their mosques to prey on the Muslim community in Columbus?
Final comment: Bravo to those Muslims courageously speaking out against the corrupt leaders who tolerate lies and fraud, and who sell their congregations away to rancid preachers like Khalid Yasin for money.
Yasin claims that AIDS was invented at a US government lab and spread by Western governments through UN agencies and Christian missionaries. (“Khalid Yasin: The New Voice of Islam?” Sunday, October 9, 2005)
Yasin justified the terrorist bombings in Bali because of years of alleged Western oppression. (“Khalid Yasin: The New Voice of Islam?” Sunday, October 9, 2005)
Yasin rejects any separation between Islam and the state and openly advocates for the reestablishment of the caliphate. (Sunday Nights with John Cleary, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, September 7, 2003)
Yasin visited Jemaah Islamiah terrorist leader Abu Bakar Bashir in prison. (“Koranic TV next step for radial sheikh”, Sydney Morning Herald, August 20, 2005)
Yasin was in Saudi Arabia on 9/11 soliciting support from the Al-Qaeda front Al-Haramain Foundation, which was designated a terrorist organization in 2004 by the US government, to help finance his Islamic Broadcasting Company.
And here are some of his statements and positions observed by the Australian media as noted in a July 24, 2005, article in the Sydney Morning Herald (“Sheikh calls Prime Minister’s comments inflammatory”):
Sheik Khalid Yasin, the executive director of the Islamic Teaching Institute which is dedicated to the work of promoting Islam, told a large gathering of young muslims at Bankstown Town Hall in Sydney last week that muslims could not be friends with anyone who did not share their faith.
“They’re not your friend because they don’t understand your religious principles and they cannot because they do not understand your faith,” he said.
The sheik said young Muslims should not attend university because they would lose their direction.
“University is a gateway for deviation,” he said.
“You forget your Islamic direction. Now you have become compromised through some kind of intellectuality.”
The sheik told the Nine Network men whose wives disobeyed them should be beaten.
He quoted a verse from the Koran and translated it.
“Now specifically, if you take that word literally, it means literally, beat them lightly,” Sheik Yasin said.
“Beat them, like I would my child.”
He also said homosexuals should be killed.
“We don’t make any excuses about that, it’s not our law, it’s the Koran,” he said.
With that in mind, it’s interesting to see that Yasin will be leading both youth and women’s events while in Columbus this week. Also interesting is that he will be speaking at Ohio State University this week, despite the fact that he’s said that Muslims should not attend university: “The university is a gateway for deviation. You forget your Islamic direction. Now you have become compromised through some kind of intellectuality.”
Will it be CAIR-OSU, the Muslim Student Association, or both sponsoring his OSU visit?
Shaykh Khalid Yasin in Columbus this week (updated schedule)
Bismillaahir Rahmaanir Raheem
Assalaamu Ê¿alaykum wa Rahmatullaahi wa Barakaatuh
Alhamdulillaah, our community is truly blessed to have with us Shaykh Khalid Yasin, perhaps best known for his powerful & inspiring lecture, The Purpose of Life. He will be visiting several locations throughout the community during his stay in the coming week, in shaaʾ Allaah. Please visit this page frequently as the schedule is being updated and finalized.
Saturday (May 24th, 2008) Ibn Taymiya Masjid & Islamic Center (map) 7:00 PM Presentation
Sunday (May 25th, 2008) Masjid Omar bin El-Khattab (map) 4:00 PM - 8:00 PM (Ladies only) After Maghrib khaatirah (everyone)
Dayton NBC affiliate WDTN-TV covers our story about international Islamic hate sheikh Khalid Yasin’s speech tomorrow evening at Sinclair Community College. For more background on Yasin’s hatemongering, extremist statements and virulent conspiracy theories, see our original post. And just for clarification, this report states that I didn’t return a request for an interview, which might be because I’m traveling out of state, and reporter Holly Samuels emailed me at 2:18pm for a 5pm report. Glad she gave me plenty of time to respond!
Khalid Yasin is one of the most notorious Islamic hate sheikhs in the world today. He had been widely condemned from the US to Britain to Australia for his virulent Wahhabism, his extreme anti-Americanism (despite the fact that he is an American-born convert), his justification of Islamic terrorism, his wild-eyed conspiracy theories, and his outright racial and religious bigotry. And an Australian news investigation found that Yasin had claimed academic degrees that the schools had no record of, and also discovered that he had engaged in outright fraud in building his international Islamic media empire.
Yasin was in Saudi Arabia on 9/11 soliciting support from the Al-Qaeda front Al-Haramain Foundation, which was designated a terrorist organization in 2004 by the US government, to help finance his Islamic Broadcasting Company.
It is difficult to overstate the hatred, bigotry, misogyny and malicious conspiracy theories spewed by Khalid Yasin. So despicable is his warped ideology that he had been made a pariah by the international media. Statements made on his DVDs were featured in the UK Channel 4 “Undercover Mosque” program, which were found available for sale in British mosques. Here’s the relevant part of that program’s transcript:
N: Regular interfaith meetings with other religions take place at this mosque, yet in a DVD (‘Changing The World Through The Da’wah’; IBC Ltd/Islam Productions) bought from its bookshop, a British-based (African-American) convert called Sheikh Khalid Yasin (KY), who studied Arabic in Saudi Arabia, condemns the teachings of other religions —
KY: “We don’t need to go to the Christians, or the Jews, debating with them about the filth which they believe . . . We Muslims have been ordered to do ‘brainwashing’ because the kuffaar . . . they are doing ‘braindefiling’ . . . You are watching the kaffir TVs, and your wife is watching right now, and your children are watching it right now, and they are being polluted, and they are being penetrated, and they are being infected, so that your children and you go out as Muslims and come back to the house as kaffirs.”
N: In this DVD (entitled: ‘Some Advice To The Muslim Woman’; Islam Productions), from the Mosque bookshop, he preaches against the equality of women
KY: “This whole delusion about the equality of women is a bunch of foolishness, there’s no such thing.”
N: In this DVD (entitled: ‘Jihad or Terrorism?’, Ahlus Sunna’wal Jama’ah), he claims that AIDS is a Western and Christian plot —
KY: “No, missionaries from the World Health Organisation and Christian groups went into Africa and inoculated people for diphtheria, malaria, yellow fever, and they put in the medicine the AIDS virus, which is a conspiracy.” (his emphasis)
In an interview with Sarah Ferguson of Australia’s Sunday program entitled, “Khalid Yasin: The New Voice of Islam?” he describes his conspiracy theories related to the 9/11 terrorist attacks, denying the existence of Al-Qaeda:
SARAH FERGUSON: And he’s waded right into one of the most divisive issues between the Muslim community and the Federal Government — September 11.
SHEIK KHALID YASIN: There has been no evidence that has surfaced, no bona fide irrevocable, irrefutable evidence that had been surfaced that showed that there is a group called al-Qa’ida that did the September 11 bombings. I’m of the opinion there was a rogue operation that took place. Now, to go beyond that would say I would have to have some evidence, which I don’t.
SARAH FERGUSON: But he does go beyond it.
SHEIK KHALID YASIN: An operation that took place with the complicity of some very sophisticated entities other than some Middle Eastern guys on an airplane or being orchestrated by someone in a cave in Iraq.
SARAH FERGUSON: What do you mean by “sophisticated entities”?
SHEIK KHALID YASIN: Sophisticated entities means entities who themselves were governmentally instructed, equipped, motivated. We now know that the way that the World Trade Center fell the way that those buildings fell — they fell from internal explosive charges, the same way it’s done in a construction site.
The Sunday program also asked him about his conspiracy theories claiming that the US government and Christian organizations are responsible for the creation and the spread of AIDS:
SARAH FERGUSON: Conspiracy theories are Yasin’s bread and butter, and the wilder, the better.
SHEIK KHALID YASIN, DVD EXCERPT: An AIDS virus, that is a classic disease that was created in Fort McKinley, United States. Fort McKinley, the AIDS virus, 63,000 gallons.
SARAH FERGUSON: This one comes from his DVD called ‘Jihad or Terrorism’.
SHEIK KHALID YASIN, DVD EXCERPT: Missionaries from the World Health Organisation and Christian groups went into Africa and inoculated people for diphtheria, malaria, yellow fever and they put in the medicine the AIDS virus.
And in a July 2003 conversation on Australia’s Sunday Nights with John Cleary program, Khalid Yasin articulated his vision of the reinstitution of sharia and the dismantling of the wall between Islam and state:
John Cleary: Where does the Sharia fit into that?
Khalid Yasin: Well the Sharia is the cement that keeps all the bricks together. The Sharia is the legislative element. The Sharia is the judicial element. This is where rules, this is where juristic decisions, this is where the courts, this is where law. And I mean if you don’t have a people that is governed by Sharia, then you have a lawless people.
John Cleary: Christianity once had a problem with that in the Middle Ages, and so canon law developed, and church law was the law of the State. And then alongside that civic law developed. And gradually over the years, they split and then civil law became predominant over church law. Do you see that sort of evolution taking place in Islam as well?
Khalid Yasin: No. As a matter of fact this dichotomy of church and State and civil law and religious law, doesn’t exist in Islam. Because the source of law has never been the human being. In Christianity the source of law, human beings have always had something to do with the evolution of the law, but in Islam it is not the case. The law is an inspiration from God, the Qu’ran is the word of God alone. Even it is not the law of Mohamed. Mohamed was inspired by God, it is his example of the law, his explanation of the law, his personal example of the law. So in this sense civil law and religious law are congruous together.
John Cleary: Could you have a secular Islamic state, like Turkey is trying to be, over the years?
Khalid Yasin: No, it doesn’t work. These are experiments that have been tried, but they haven’t worked. Of course, you can have it, but you’ll see that after a certain amount of time it disintegrates, it cannot work.
John Cleary: So ultimately the Sharia should become the law of the land?
Khalid Yasin: Exactly. It has to be. I mean, who is the best lawgiver? Who is the best legislator: the designer, the author, the creator or the human beings who themselves are subjected to that law? It has to be.
SARAH FERGUSON: Yasin moved to the UK. He made headquarters here in the northern city of Sheffield and began looking for new investors. Armed with this glossy brochure on the UK operation, Yasin came back to Australia last year.
VOICE-OVER: Islamic Broadcasting Corporation — a unique investment opportunity. It will host up to 50 multimedia TV channels and five radio stations. potentially serving 1.2 billion viewers across the globe.
SARAH FERGUSON: The brochure’s biggest selling point is a TV broadcast centre in Coventry, complete with photos and architects’ drawings.
VOICE-OVER: We are currently relocating to our brand new purpose-built 8,000 square feet broadcast centre. It will be opened for business in September 2005.
SARAH FERGUSON: By the time we’d discovered Yasin’s brochure, Yasin had left the country on an overseas trip. We put its claims to the new managing director of IBC Australia, Walid Ali. IBC in the UK claims it’s building a massive ?2 million broadcast centre. And that broadcast centre is under construction now. In fact it’s supposed to be ready now. Have you seen it?
WALID ALI, MANAGING DIRECTOR ISLAMIC BROADCASTING GROUP: I will be very honest with you. I don’t know a great deal about their operations but I do know that that facility has not been built as yet. Obviously with any organisation, any business venture that you take on, there will be unexpected delays. I’m sure they’re having some unexpected delays. The idea of a Muslim-owned TV station was very attractive to Muslims here, and the brochure was crucial. Yasin used it to convince them that the UK operation was worth investing in. We’ve spoken to people who attended fundraisers in Sydney run by Yasin. At one event last year, $90,000 was pledged in a single evening. We’ve also seen bank documents transferring almost $50,000 of that money to a bank account in the UK in the name of one of Yasin’s companies.
The question is — what happened to that money? This is the real technology park in Coventry and there is no broadcast centre because the brochure is a work of fiction, indeed fraud. Yasin’s only connection with the Coventry Technology Park was a small office space rented out by his UK associate Channel Islam. According to the company which leases space here, Channel Islam broke its lease last year and is being pursued by debt collectors. None of these groups is collaborating with Yasin. The sums don’t add up and the drawings were lifted from someone else’s brochure.
MUHAMMAD ALI, ISLAM CHANNEL, UK: I don’t think now after this long time of promises that channel is going to start broadcasting tomorrow, after tomorrow, next week, next month, next year I don’t think there is much credibility left for such promises.
*****
SARAH FERGUSON: Where Yasin’s accreditation lies is another mystery. He prepared this CV to support an application to the Immigration Department. Neither institution has any record of a Khalid Yasin graduating. While he was still in Australia, we asked Yasin about his qualifications as a preacher.
SHEIK KHALID YASIN: I say to you that whatever qualifications I have they are subjective. And I don’t even care. And if there was a choice for Khalid Yasin I would take any qualification, academic qualification I have and I throw it out the window. And I tell you whatever other qualifications I have, whatever convictions I have will stand on their own.
SARAH FERGUSON: The issue is that he has claimed to have those qualifications. I’ve checked. He doesn’t. Does that concern you?
WALID ALI: Well, I guess it would concern me. I would really need to understand why he would make those claims if they weren’t true.
SARAH FERGUSON: Sunday sent Yasin a series of questions about these discrepancies but we haven’t received a reply. No doubt his rhetoric of Muslim victimhood will apply equally to him.
See also the August 2005 Sydney Morning Herald article on Yasin, “Koranic TV next step for radical sheik”, where he reaffirms many of these extremist positions.
