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Adam Gadahn’s Extremist American Mentor
By
Debbie Schlussel
[email protected]
"He was becoming very extreme in his ideas and views. I
never thought that he would go to that level."
That’s what Muzammil Siddiqi says about Adam Gadahn, the
American convert to Islam and one of seven suspected Al-Qaeda operatives sought
by the FBI.
But Siddiqi, the Executive Director of the Islamic Society of
Orange County—Gadahn’s former mosque, is the real extremist. Siddiqi taught
regular classes and delivered the weekly Friday afternoon sermons at Gadahn’s
mosque. And given his views, it’s no surprise that Gadahn is now suspected of
involvement with terrorists.
In 1995, Siddiqi praised jihad and martyrdom in the Kansas
City Star. "Those who die on the part of justice are alive, and their place
is with [Allah], and they receive the highest position, because this is the
highest honor."
Siddiqi wants the United States to become a Muslim country
through "gradual change," and that shariah (Islamic law) should become
our law. "Allah’s rules have to be established in all lands, and all our
efforts should lead to that direction," he wrote in 1996.
He opposes Muslims serving in the U.S. military or defending
the U.S. "Islam will not allow a Muslim to be drafted by non-Muslims to
defend concepts, ideologies, and values other than those of Islam . . . .
A Muslim shall defend non-Muslim lands not," Siddiqi said in an article
entitled, "Basic Principles of Involvement in War in Islam," in 1991.
"America has to learn," Siddiqi said at an October
2000 protest outside the White House. "If you remain on the side of
injustice, the wrath of God will come. Please! Please all American, do you
remember that, that Allah is watching everyone . . . . If you continue doing
injustice, and tolerating injustice, the wrath of God will come."
In 1989, the L.A. Times asked whether he agrees with the death
sentence fatwa issued by Iran against author Salman Rushdie. Instead of saying
no, he said that it would have to be determined by Islamic law.
Siddiqi is one of the most prominent Muslim leaders in
America. Until late 2001, he headed the Saudi-funded Islamic Society of North
America (ISNA), which owns and controls at least 27% of America’s mosques and
many American Islamic schools through an ISNA subsidiary.
ISNA is at the forefront of promoting extremist Wahhabi Islam
and often uses extremists to take over and seize control of relatively moderate
mosques. Sometimes that involves violence, such as a May 1987 scuffle at a Tampa
mosque by the family of the now indicted, alleged Islamic Jihad frontman, Sami
Al-Arian. In a letter, Al-Arian refers to an official at an ISNA conference
agreeing to donate $20,000 to his terror efforts.
While Siddiqi headed the ISNA, the group aided Hamas Political
Director Musa Abu Marzook, by giving his legal defense fund a platform at its
conferences around the U.S. In an open letter published in the Washington Report
on Middle East Affairs, Marzook thanked ISNA while he was in prison awaiting
extradition. Marzook was unsuccessfully fighting deportation. Now in Syria, the
United States has indicted him.
Adv: What
does the government know about you?
Siddiqi and ISNA aren’t the most disturbing things in the
Adam Gadahn saga. More disturbing are the failure of Gadahn’s parents to check
into Siddiqi, who headed their son’s new mosque.
President Bush shares that failure.
Siddiqi was a frequent honored guest of the Bush White House,
which chose him as the Muslim representative to lead the national prayer
service at National Cathedral right after 9-11. Bush gladly accepted a Koran
from Siddiqi at a September 26, 2001, White House meeting, reminding Americans
that Siddiqi "led the service at the National Cathedral." "He did
a heck of a good job and we were proud to have him there," Bush gushed.
Then there’s the media, including the New York Times and LA
Times, which took great pains to distance Gadahn’s extremism from Siddiqi’s
"moderation." Rather than mention a single radical view of the
extremist cleric, the L.A. Times refers to him as "the
Harvard-educated" Muslim leader. As if one educated at Harvard couldn’t
possibly be the least bit radical.
With the President, the media, and America’s Muslims
honoring extremists like Siddiqi, the resulting Adam Gadahns are no surprise.
The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
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