The Muslim Brotherhood’s Muslim Students’ Association: What Americans Need to Know
by Christopher Holton
Recent news reports about the exposure of Michigan Democratic gubernatorial candidate Abdul El-Sayed’s possible ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and the biased–even corrupt–attacks by the so-called “mainstream” media on State Senator Patrick Colbeck for bringing the issue up, should pique the curiosity of every American who has an interest in the security and sanctity of our nation, our rule of law and our culture.
Without delving into the political battle raging in Michigan, I feel compelled to clear the air about one particular Muslim Brotherhood organization of which El-Sayed was not just affiliated, but of which he was a leader: The Muslim Students’ Association (MSA).
Evidently, according to news reports, El-Sayed was a Vice President of his MSA chapter in college. That indicates an early affiliation with the Muslim Brotherhood.
This isn’t a “conspiracy theory” as the corrupt, Leftist media in America likes to claim. Much is known about the Muslim Students’ Association and, after reading about it, I think you’ll agree that El-Sayed should be asked to renounce the organization.
A Short History of the Muslim Students’ Association in America
The first chapter of the MSA was founded way back in 1963 at the University of Illinois-Urbana/Champaign. It was founded by members of the Muslim Brotherhood, an organization that most Americans would not even be remotely aware of for another half century.
Among the founders of the MSA in America was Hisham Al Talib, a man who would later go on to become a co-founder of the SAAR Foundation, an organization that was dissolved in 2000 when it became the target of an FBI investigation for providing funding to HAMAS, Hezbollah, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Al Qaeda.
Another founder of the MSA was Jamal Barzinji, who, in 1991 was also the founder of the Dar al-Hijrah mosque in Falls Church, Virginia. Dar al-Hijrah is perhaps most famous for being the mosque at which Nidal Malik Hasan (the Fort Hood shooter) worshipped under Anwar al-Awlaki, who later became the head of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (more on Awlaki shortly).
According to a 2008 New York Times report, right from the outset the MSA received its funding and direction from Saudi Arabia. The MSA was a product of the Saudi Wahhabi-run Muslim World League, a Saudi NGO with a history of ties to Jihadist terrorism. In fact, the MSA was the first effort in America by the Saudis to establish Islamic organizations around the world to promote Wahhabi Islam, the strain of Islam that would eventually give birth to Al Qaeda.
In other words, the MSA was founded and established in the USA by what should rightly be considered a hostile foreign power, namely Saudi Arabia.
MSA solicited donations for the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, whose assets the U.S. government seized in December 2001 because that organization was giving financial support to the terrorist group Hamas. MSA also has strong ties to the World Assembly of Muslim Youth (WAMY), a Saudi-based Islamic organization with chapters in 57 countries, including the US chapter, which was founded by Osama Bin Laden’s nephew. WAMY promotes jihad and anti-semitism and has raised funds for HAMAS.
Not only does the MSA have a troubling history, its members and leaders have included more than just a few jihadists:
• On October 22, 2000, Ahmed Shama, president of the UCLA Muslim Students Association, led a crowd of demonstrators at the Israeli consulate in chants of “Death to Israel!” and “Death to the Jews!”
• The University of Southern California MSA invited Taliban ambassador Sayyid Hashimi to speak on campus six months before 9/11.
• In 2003, University of Idaho MSA president Sami Omar Al-Hussayen, who had sought access to a chemical lab containing nuclear material, was ordered deported because he worked for the al Qaeda-tied Islamic Assembly of North America.
• In April 2003, FBI agents, who had secretly videotaped foreign student members of MSA who were illegally engaged in weapons training, raided the apartment of Hassan Alrefae and Jaber Al-Thukair, Arizona State’s MSA president and vice president, respectively.
• In June 2006, Ali Asad Chandia, who had served as president of the Montgomery College (Maryland) MSA in 1998 and 1999, was convicted on terror charges as part of a Northern Virginia jihad network; he was sentenced to 15 years in prison for three separate counts of conspiracy and material support to the Pakistani terrorist group Lashkar-e-Taiba.
• Abdurahman Alamoudi, who served as MSA national president in 1982 and 1983, is currently serving a 23-year prison sentence for his extensive international terrorist activities, which included fundraising for al Qaeda.
• In February 2010, Aafia Siddiqui – a woman who had been captured in 2008 with explosives, deadly chemicals, and a list of New York City landmarks – was convicted of attempting to murder a U.S. Army captain while she was incarcerated and being interrogated by authorities at a prison in Afghanistan. Described variously as “al-Qaeda’s Mata Hari” and “Lady al-Qaeda,” Siddiqui had previously been a member of the MSA chapter at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she studied neuroscience.
• Wael Hamza Julaidan, who served as president of the University of Arizona MSA in the mid-1980s, went on to become one of al Qaeda’s co-founders and its logistics chief. In September 2002, the U.S. government listed Julaidan as a specially designated global terrorist, identifying him as a close associate of Osama bin Laden and other al-Qaeda leaders, and as a director of the Rabita Trust, which had already been designated a terrorist finance entity that supported al-Qaeda.
• University of Idaho MSA president Sami Omar Al-Hussayen, who operated nearly a dozen Arabic-language websites for anti-American, pro-suicide-bombing clerics, was accused by federal authorities of using his academic studies as a cover for terrorist support activities. Al-Hussayen was deported to Saudi Arabia in June 2004 after agreeing to a deal with federal prosecutors.
• In December 2009, Howard University dental student Ramy Zamzam, who had served as the president of MSA’s D.C. Council, was arrested in Pakistan along with four other D.C.-area men (all of whom were also active in MSA). All five were charged with plotting to join the Jaish-e-Muhammed terrorist group with plans to attack U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan; all five were convicted in a Pakistani court in June 2010 and sentenced to at least 10 years in prison.
• Syed Maaz Shah, secretary of the University of Texas-Dallas MSA chapter, was arrested in December 2006, for his involvement in paramilitary training at an Islamic campground, where he was preparing to join the Taliban in order to fight U.S. troops in Afghanistan. Shah was convicted on weapons charges in May 2007.
• Ziyad Khaleel, president of the Columbia College (Missouri) MSA, was a representative of the Islamic Association for Palestine (a Hamas front). He also registered and operated the English-language website for Hamas, and served as al Qaeda’s chief procurement agent in the United States during the 1990s. Among the items Khaleel purchased was a $7,500 satellite phone for Osama bin Laden. That phone, dubbed by intelligence authorities as the “jihad phone,” was used to plan the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings.
• Anwar Al-Awlaki served as president of the Colorado State University MSA in the early 1990s, and as chaplain of the George Washington University MSA in 2001. In Washington, DC, he delivered sermons that were attended by two of the 9/11 hijackers and by Fort Hood shooter Nidal Malik Hasan. In 2002 Alwaki fled the U.S. for Yemen, where he developed ties to al Qaeda and reportedly played a role in the Fort Hood massacre of 2009, the failed Christmas Day underwear-bomber plot of 2009, and the attempted Times Square bombing of 2010.
• Carlos Bledsoe, aka Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, was a member of the MSA as a student at Tennessee State University in Nashville, TN. Bledsoe went on to receive terrorist training at a jihadist training camp in Yemen and returned to the US and murdered US Army Private Andy Long outside a Little Rock, Arkansas recruiting office on June 1, 2009.
• Abu Mansoor al-Amriki, aka Omar Hammami was an American-born member of al Shahab, a Somali Islamic militant group aligned with al Qaeda. Hammami served as president of the MSA chapter at the University of South Alabama.
• Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who would later go on to mastermind the September 11th terrorist attacks as the number 3 man in Al Qaeda, was a member of the MSA chapter at North Carolina A&T in 1986.
Given the history of the MSA right from the point of its founding, and the activities of its members and leaders in recent years in particular, there is every reason to be concerned about the MSA and anyone who was a leader in its ranks.
It is certainly not unreasonable to expect at least an explanation from Abdul El-Sayed of his affiliation with the MSA and disclosing any other Muslim Brotherhood organizations with which he is associated.
Much of this profile appeared previously on The Hayride blog.
