Tech for Palestine founder Paul Biggar invoked the false genocide claim against Israel at Istanbul’s TRT World Forum, alleging that Google, Amazon, Microsoft and Palantir sell technologies enabling it.

Although the forum’s sessions covered economics, energy security and AI, speakers repeatedly returned to Gaza, denunciations of Israel, appeals on behalf of Palestinians and accusations of genocide. The rhetoric extended beyond the dedicated Gaza panel into discussions of global leadership, technology and maritime trade. The same program included Turkey’s serving intelligence chief, his predecessor and the head of an academy established within the intelligence agency.

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Biggar’s appearance, alongside other controversial and intelligence-linked figures, was previewed in Jewish Onliner’s October 21 report.

Allegations Against Israel Across the Agenda

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan outlined an agenda spanning energy, economics, AI and transport in his November 6 speech. He compared Gaza with the 1995 Srebrenica genocide, in which Bosnian Serb forces killed more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys. He also alleged that what he called “settler terrorism” was intended to drive Palestinians from their land.

Erdoğan portrayed international institutions as passive spectators and accused press-freedom organizations of favoring Israel while attacking Turkey. They became a “paper tiger” when confronting what he called a “genocidal network,” he said. He also praised TRT for strengthening Turkey’s struggle for justice “on the media front.”

The organizers’ 2026 booklet described “Israel’s genocidal campaign” in its Gaza session introduction. That language built the accusation into the session’s premise. At that panel, former South African foreign minister Naledi Pandor advocated boycotts, sanctions and divestment.

Other Turkish officials reinforced that framing. In his opening address, communications chief Burhanettin Duran described Gaza as evidence of the international system’s failure and placed such gatherings within Ankara’s “forum diplomacy,” developed in line with Erdoğan’s vision. TRT director general Mehmet Zahid Sobacı declared, in remarks translated from Turkish, “Türkiye’s standard of rights and justice is TRT’s broadcasting standard.”

Biggar’s Pro-Palestine Advocacy Amplified on Turkish State Media

TRT presented Biggar through his technology credentials. Its biography highlighted his founding of CircleCI and Darklang alongside Tech for Palestine’s work incubating advocacy projects. His November 7 panel included technology executive Khaled Koubaa and Sycamore Foundation founder Sharif Banna.

Anadolu’s Turkish-language account, published November 8, quoted Biggar as saying, in translation: “These companies sell tools that enable genocide through digital technologies.” He promoted UpScrolled and Thaura as alternatives to established platforms. Tech for Palestine’s October challenge promoted projects helping users switch from Instagram to UpScrolled and from ChatGPT to Thaura, connecting its pro-Palestine advocacy to efforts to change which technology services people use.

Biggar’s allegations fit the broader Gaza GenoLIE campaign, extending the false genocide accusation into the technology sector as he claimed that major Western companies were helping enable it.

Intelligence Figures Amplify Ankara’s Pro-Palestinian Messaging

Turkey’s serving and former intelligence chiefs addressed the same conflict in separate sessions. İbrahim Kalın, head of Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization (MİT), addressed the Gaza session on November 6. The forum quoted him saying, “The struggle for peace, dignity and freedom in Palestine is, in fact, about reclaiming the moral and political order we have lost in a broken world.”

The genocide accusation also surfaced in a discussion of maritime trade. Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, who previously directed MİT for 13 years, accused Israel of expansionism and continuing “genocide”, according to TRT World’s English-language report of the session on sea lanes and trade corridors. As the preview reported, Fidan had met Hamas political bureau chief Khalil al-Hayya in Ankara on October 9.

Talha Köse, president of the National Intelligence Academy established within MİT, also spoke on energy security.

Jewish Onliner’s initial report also noted that the advertised speaker lineup included IHH-affiliated researcher Riad Domazeti and Russian analyst Ruslan Pukhov, whom Estonia’s Foreign Intelligence Service identified as an FSB agent.

Biggar’s Record Before the Forum

Biggar’s earlier statements had been documented before the event. As Jewish Onliner reported, his April 2024 blog post described Hamas membership as “not illegal or even wrong” and disputed reports of rape committed by Hamas during the October 7 terror attacks.

Jewish Onliner also documented a Tech for Palestine-promoted chatbot portraying October 7 as legitimate resistance and reported the group’s invitation to ISNAD founder Ezzeldeen Dwedar, examining his Muslim Brotherhood ties and statements in support of Hamas.

Biggar’s record was public before his appearance. TRT gave him a speaking platform at a forum featuring figures from multiple foreign intelligence services, and Anadolu circulated his arguments. His accusations reinforced the forum’s recurring pro-Palestinian messaging and claims that Israel was committing “genocide.” His campaign gained amplification through a state media platform whose leaders explicitly connected their work to Ankara’s political objectives.

The British government has funded an AI initiative involving Qatar Charity, an international aid organization designated by Israel in 2008 over allegations of financing Hamas. The British Embassy-backed program brought Qatar Charity together with Qatar’s foreign ministry, state development fund, and charity regulator for a four-day fellowship in London and Cambridge.

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The charity is also represented in British-funded academic research and named as a contributor to a broader humanitarian AI project. The partnerships raise questions about British due diligence involving an organization that has faced terrorism-financing allegations, international restrictions, and scrutiny over its financial activities.

British-Funded Fellowship and Research

Qatar University announced on November 3 that the British Embassy in Doha funded the inaugural Qatar–UK Fellowship on AI in Humanitarian Action. Participants represented Qatar Charity, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Qatar Fund for Development, the Regulatory Authority for Charitable Activities (RACA), Qatar Red Crescent Society, Education Above All Foundation, and universities.

The program included discussions with Britain’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), the Charity Commission, and UK Health Security Agency, alongside visits involving Google and the House of Lords. Discussions covered AI regulation, institutional risk management, and humanitarian applications. Qatar University did not identify Qatar Charity’s individual delegate.

A September study in Frontiers in Public Health establishes another connection. Qatar Charity researcher Abdelaziz Khatir Jadeed and FCDO-affiliated official Kwalombota Kwalombota were among its nine authors. The paper acknowledges British government funding and credits Kwalombota with contributing to the investigation and manuscript review.

A Broader AI Partnership

The fellowship follows an October 2025 agreement between Qatar University and the British Embassy to develop humanitarian AI coordination, data sharing, early-warning systems, and ethical guidelines intended to inform international standards.

The resulting Humanitarian AI Observatory explicitly names Qatar Charity among its contributors. It describes a technical working group led by Qatar’s foreign ministry, co-led by Qatar Fund for Development, and operating in partnership with the FCDO. The group helps shape the project’s technical direction, validate outputs, and guide responsible AI governance.

Qatar Charity has independently disclosed substantial existing AI capabilities. At an August 2026 forum hosted by RACA, a charity executive described using AI for country-risk assessments, partner due diligence, supplier screening, and project monitoring. The forum specifically addressed money laundering and terrorist-financing risks within Qatar’s nonprofit sector.

The British partnership therefore involves a charity already applying AI to sensitive financial and operational functions, as the wider initiative moves toward developing practical humanitarian technology.

Qatar Charity’s Terrorism-Financing Allegations

Israel listed Qatar Charity as an unlawful association in 2008 over allegations of financing Hamas. Israeli authorities subsequently imposed financial restrictions involving the organization, including a 2011 measure prohibiting local organizations from receiving its funds.

In June 2017, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Egypt included Qatar Charity on a terrorism blacklist during their diplomatic confrontation with Doha.

Qatar Charity also faced American civil litigation alleging financial support for Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. In Force v. Qatar Charity, plaintiffs alleged that the organization helped channel funds through Qatari banks to support terrorist operations.

Separate scrutiny has focused on Qatar Charity’s European financing network. A 2019 investigation by French journalists Christian Chesnot and Georges Malbrunot, based on reportedly leaked internal documents, identified approximately €71 million in Qatar Charity funding for 140 mosque and Islamic-center projects across Europe. The journalists associated parts of that financing network with organizations close to the Muslim Brotherhood.

Qatar’s Terrorist-Financing Oversight Under Scrutiny

Concerns extend to Qatar’s broader regulatory environment. In its 2023 evaluation, the Financial Action Task Force credited improvements in the country’s safeguards but identified significant shortcomings in terrorist-financing investigations and prosecutions.

FATF specifically found that Qatari authorities had insufficiently advanced investigations and prosecutions involving the potential abuse of licensed nonprofit organizations. It also identified weaknesses in converting financial intelligence into effective enforcement action.

Those findings make the participation of RACA, Qatar’s charity regulator, alongside Qatar Charity in the British-backed initiative particularly relevant to questions about financial compliance, institutional capacity, and oversight.

Western Technology Partnerships Face Scrutiny

Western technology cooperation with Qatari institutions has drawn criticism elsewhere. In The Cipher Brief, Foundation for Defense of Democracies senior adviser Toby Dershowitz and Asher Boiskin examined Google Cloud’s AI partnership with Qatar-funded Al Jazeera, warning about the potential amplification of state-directed narratives through advanced AI systems. They called for stronger risk assessments and transparency surrounding such partnerships.

Their analysis concerned Al Jazeera rather than Qatar Charity, but raised related questions about how Western governments and technology companies assess Qatari institutional partners before providing advanced technological capabilities.

British Funding Raises Oversight Questions

Britain’s involvement now encompasses funded research, institutional exchanges, and an expanding partnership to develop humanitarian AI capabilities and governance frameworks. Qatar Charity’s inclusion connects that effort to an organization with a documented history of terrorism-financing allegations and international financial restrictions.

Qatar University’s November 3 announcement indicates that the next phase will involve developing and testing practical AI applications, deepening cooperation between British institutions and Qatar’s humanitarian sector.

The central accountability question is what due diligence British authorities conducted before including Qatar Charity in the initiative, and what safeguards will govern its participation as the partnership develops.

With British funding supporting the effort, Qatar Charity’s controversial history and existing use of AI for financial and operational oversight make those questions a matter of public accountability.

British Conservative MP Nick Timothy on November 4 published a letter to Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood seeking action over The Thinking Muslim Conference and, in a follow-up post, linked directly to a September 14 Jewish Onliner investigation that identified the West London event’s original speaker lineup and documented the records of several advertised participants. The conference is scheduled for November 8.

In the post releasing the letter, Timothy said one advertised speaker had expressed willingness to carry out a suicide bombing, while another had been described as an al-Qaeda member and later met a Taliban official. Timothy, the MP for West Suffolk and shadow justice secretary, asked what action the Home Office was taking, whether visas had been granted to any speakers or attendees, and whether Mahmood was “content for it to go ahead.”

The letter and the concerns it raised were also covered by the British publication The Conservative Post. Its November 5 report detailed Timothy’s request for a Home Office investigation and examined the previous statements and alleged associations cited in his letter.

The letter named Azzam Tamimi, CAGE International senior director Moazzam Begg and CAIR-Michigan executive director Dawud Walid, all of whom were examined in Jewish Onliner’s original report. Timothy cited Tamimi’s 2004 statement to the BBC that he would sacrifice himself for “Palestine” if given the opportunity, a U.S. Department of Defense document prepared for a 2004 military tribunal identifying Begg as “a member of al Qaida and other affiliated terrorist organizations,” and a 2012 sermon in which Walid asked who had incurred the wrath of Allah before answering in Arabic, “They are the Jews, they are the Jews.”

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Hamas “Special Envoy” and Muslim Brotherhood Figure No Longer Listed

Azzam Tamimi, whom Jewish Onliner previously identified as having been described as a Hamas “special envoy” and a “leading member of the Muslim Brotherhood in Britain,” is no longer listed as a conference speaker. The descriptions appeared in a 2016 Sunday Times report and a 2014 article published by Ikhwanweb, the Muslim Brotherhood’s official English-language website.

Tamimi appeared as a featured speaker on an archived version of the conference website captured on September 14, when Jewish Onliner published its initial investigation. He is no longer included on the current page.

On October 21, The Thinking Muslim announced that Tamimi was “unable to attend” and that Mazen Mokhtar had been added to the program. The organizers did not publicly state why Tamimi withdrew.

New Conference Speaker Was Investigated Over Websites Linked to Taliban Fundraising

The conference’s newly added speaker, Mazen Mokhtar, is the chief executive officer of Baitulmaal, an Irving, Texas-based international humanitarian charity registered as a 501(c)(3). Muslim American Society tax filings also identify Mokhtar, under several spelling variations, as the organization’s executive director during the mid-2010s, including fiscal years 2014, 2015 and 2016.

The most notable episode in Mokhtar’s public background concerns a 2004 federal investigation involving a website he registered and administered. Contemporary Washington Post reporting said authorities were investigating whether Mokhtar had worked with British terrorism suspect Babar Ahmad through a network of websites connected to Azzam Publications.

According to an affidavit described by the newspaper, Mokhtar’s website, minna.com, was an exact replica or mirror of websites operated by Ahmad. Investigators alleged that the sites solicited funds for the Taliban and Chechen mujahideen and said copies of Azzam Publications websites were found on Mokhtar’s computer.

A second Washington Post report said Homeland Security agents searched Mokhtar’s New Jersey home and seized computer files and other records. Court papers alleged that Azzam Publications administrators and individuals in the United States had worked together to solicit funds for the Taliban and Chechen mujahideen.

Begg Accuses MP of Islamophobia"

Moazzam Begg responded to Timothy’s letter by opening, “Met with the Taliban? Are you thick, Nick?” and later telling the MP he was “late to the Islamophobic party.” Begg did not deny meeting Taliban figures.

Begg also disputed the U.S. government’s assessment of his alleged al-Qaeda membership. The September 2004 military tribunal summary nevertheless contains the language quoted by Timothy and alleged that Begg had recruited individuals for al-Qaeda training camps, provided financial and material support to them, and received training at such facilities. Those allegations formed part of an administrative military proceeding and were not established through a criminal conviction.

The conference’s website continues to list Begg and Dawud Walid among its speakers, with the venue identified only as West London.

ABSoc for Justice, in collaboration with London’s Palestine House, is scheduled to hold a “Guide to Islamic Activism” workshop on November 14. The four-hour program will run from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the central London venue, according to the event listing.

The event will feature Batool Subeiti, who celebrated the Hamas-led October 7 massacre and later traveled to Lebanon to meet senior Hezbollah official Mohammad Raad, according to previous reporting. The flyer says the discussion will cover questions including “How Can Muslims Engage in Lawfare Against Zionists?”, “Who Should Muslims Vote For?” and “How Should Muslims Combat Islamophobia?”, as well as “Street Activism, Direct Action & More.” Other advertised speakers at the event include Ammar Kazmi, Aymun Moosavi and Zayn Ahmed.

ABSoc for Justice describes itself as the activist wing of the Muslim Student Council, an umbrella body for AhlulBayt Islamic Societies at more than 45 British universities, according to parliamentary evidence. Metro reported that ABSoc for Justice has worked with Press TV, the U.S.-sanctioned Iranian state broadcaster that the Treasury says has been used by Iranian intelligence services to recruit “sensitive assets.” The group has repeatedly collaborated with the Islamic Human Rights Commission, which has faced allegations of links to the Iranian government and IRGC, according to the same Metro investigation.

Subeiti Celebrated the October 7 Massacre

Subeiti repeatedly praised the Hamas-led attack as it unfolded. In one October 7 post, she listed what she said the ‘Palestinian resistance singlehandedly achieved’ during the opening hours. Her list included kidnappings, Israeli deaths, armed incursions into Israeli communities, the seizure of military vehicles and Israelis fleeing toward the airport.

In another October 7 post, Subeiti shared a Khamenei Media post quoting remarks the Iranian supreme leader had made four days earlier that the “usurper Zionist regime is coming to an end.” Subeiti stressed that Khamenei had made the statement on October 3. She wrote that the words were not simply rhetoric, adding that “leaders of the resistance field” were watching what was being “cooked in the dark of the night” and giving glimpses of what was to come.

The Jewish Chronicle separately reported that Subeiti described October 7 as “unprecedented revenge” and praised the attack’s “creativity and execution.”

Subeiti Later Met Senior Hezbollah Official

Subeiti later traveled to Lebanon with her sister Fatima while working on a documentary about their grandfather, Muhammad Hadi al-Subeiti. During the trip, she met Mohammad Raad, the head of Hezbollah’s parliamentary bloc, according to the same report.

Hezbollah is proscribed as a terrorist organization in its entirety in the United Kingdom. The British government announced on February 25, 2019 that it would extend the existing ban on Hezbollah’s military wing to the entire organization. The government said it could no longer distinguish between the group’s military and political wings. The full proscription came into force on March 1, 2019.

A social-media post shared by the sisters described their grandfather as a founding member of Iraq’s Islamic Da’wa Party. It also said he had helped with the “formation of the Islamic resistance of Lebanon,” according to the JC. During their meeting, Raad reportedly spoke about their grandfather’s “martyrdom” and the “strength and dynamism of his ideas,” the newspaper reported.

An Iraqi academic study independently identifies Muhammad Hadi al-Subeiti as a major Da’wa leader who assumed leadership of the party in the 1960s and wrote much of its clandestine central publication. Separately, Iraqi writer and Da’wa historian Ali al-Mu’min writes that the movement’s Lebanese organization later became a “backbone” of the emerging Hezbollah. He names future Hezbollah leaders Hassan Nasrallah, Naim Qassem and Mohammad Raad among figures who had belonged to Da’wa.

Subeiti Wrote for Hezbollah-Affiliated Al Mayadeen

Subeiti has also written for Al Mayadeen and Al Mayadeen English, according to her published-media profile and the outlet’s own promotional material. A 2023 U.S. State Department report referred to Al Mayadeen as a Lebanese “Hizballah-affiliated media network.”

In one Al Mayadeen English post promoting her work, the outlet said Subeiti argued that the “Resistance Axis” should draw lessons from Qassem Soleimani and Hassan Nasrallah and recognize the importance of “unity of the fronts.” Her media profile also lists work appearing in Iran’s Press TV, Tehran Times and Mehr News Agency.

Kazmi Hosts Program on Sanctioned Iranian State Broadcaster

Another advertised speaker, Ammar Kazmi, hosts the political program Attrition on U.S.-sanctioned Press TV, according to the broadcaster’s program archive. Episodes hosted by Kazmi have examined Shia “resistance movements” stretching from Lebanon to Iran.

Co-Host Is Activist Arm of National Campus Network

ABSoc for Justice describes itself as the activist wing of the Muslim Student Council, which serves as an umbrella body for AhlulBayt Islamic Societies at more than 45 universities in Britain, according to parliamentary evidence. The Muslim Student Council says it runs national campaigns, conferences and partnerships across the network. Individual university ABSocs operate locally, according to its website.

The Community Security Trust told Parliament that ABSoc for Justice’s social-media activity had included implicit glorification of proscribed organizations and their leaders, “predominantly Hizbollah and Hamas.” CST also said the group had explicitly glorified Iran’s “Axis of Resistance,” according to its submission.

CST identified cleric Hussain Makke as one of ABSoc for Justice’s “main political advisors.” It said he had been barred from Australia following his attendance at Hassan Nasrallah’s funeral and statements praising Nasrallah and the “Resistance,” according to the same evidence.

ABSoc for Justice has repeatedly collaborated with the Islamic Human Rights Commission, which acknowledged working with the group on “numerous occasions” in a published response.

Palestine House Founded by Veteran Gaza Flotilla Organizer

Palestine House identifies Osama Qashoo as its founder. Qashoo has said he co-founded the International Solidarity Movement, according to a biographical interview. Later reporting identifies him as a co-founder of the Free Gaza Movement and a key organizer of the 2010 Gaza flotilla involving the Mavi Marmara.

Qashoo remained involved in Gaza flotilla activity in 2025, when the Associated Press identified him as captain of a support vessel in the Global Sumud Flotilla, according to AP reporting.

ISM co-founder Huwaida Arraf acknowledged in a 2006 Washington Post letter that the International Solidarity Movement “cooperates with Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.”

The venue has also installed a rooftop statue of imprisoned Fatah figure Marwan Barghouti. Barghouti was convicted by an Israeli court in 2004 of five murders connected to Second Intifada attacks and sentenced to five life terms, according to October reporting.

A new study published in PNAS Nexus found that Americans shown attacks against Jews through victims’ support for Israel were significantly less likely to oppose the violence than those shown attacks through victims’ Jewish religious identity. In a preregistered, nationally representative survey of 2,000 U.S. adults, opposition fell by 8.5 percentage points when victims were described through expressions of Zionism rather than religious faith. The shift did not significantly increase support for the attacks. Instead, more respondents moved into an ambivalent position.

The study, by Princeton University researchers Rafaela Dancygier and Jonathan Mummolo and Dartmouth College professor Sean Westwood, also examined news coverage of U.S. anti-Jewish hate crimes after October 7, 2023. The researchers found that more than one in five headlines in their sample introduced Israel, Palestine, Gaza or another nationalist or geopolitical dimension.

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Opposition Fell When Support for Israel Was Emphasized

The researchers conducted two experiments testing whether descriptions of an attack changed public reaction. In the religious condition, respondents were told about Jews attacked while entering a synagogue or because they wore a kippah. In the nationalist condition, they were told about Jews attacked for carrying an Israeli flag or saying Israel should exist as a homeland for the Jewish people.

The first experiment, conducted in December 2024 with 2,507 respondents, found an 8.17-point difference in opposition between the two treatments. Opposition stood at 86.1% under the religious condition and 77.9% under the nationalist condition, while ambivalence increased from 11.1% to 18.8%. Support remained essentially unchanged. After a multiple-comparisons correction, however, the first study’s results fell just short of conventional statistical significance.

The researchers then replicated the experiment in March 2025 with a preregistered YouGov survey of 2,000 U.S. adults. Opposition to attacks on Jews stood at 91.8% under the religious treatment and 83.3% under the nationalist treatment, an 8.5-point difference. Ambivalence rose from 5.3% to 16.4%, while the difference in outright support was not statistically significant.

One in Five Headlines Used a Nationalist Frame

The researchers separately analyzed news coverage of religious hate crimes reported between October 7, 2023 and the end of 2024. FBI data included in the study recorded 2,888 anti-Jewish incidents during that period, compared with 348 anti-Muslim incidents and 32 anti-Hindu incidents. Anti-Jewish incidents accounted for 71.9% of the single-bias religious hate crimes in the dataset.

Their media sample contained 2,048 articles covering 628 distinct anti-Jewish incidents. Among headlines about those attacks, 63.3% used only a religious frame, 10.7% used only a nationalist frame and another 11.2% combined both.

The researchers used OpenAI’s GPT-5.4 to classify headlines into nationalist, religious, both or neither categories, with human validation of the classifications. The study does not claim journalists deliberately used nationalist framing to minimize antisemitism. Its media analysis documents how attacks were presented, while the randomized experiments tested how those presentations can affect public attitudes.

Capital Jewish Museum Killings Illustrate the Divide

The study used the May 2025 killings of Israeli Embassy employees Sarah Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington as a case study. According to a Justice Department superseding indictment, alleged gunman Elias Rodriguez called out “Free Palestine” during the shooting. Prosecutors allege that after entering the museum he said, “I did it for Palestine. I did it for Gaza.”

Crucially, the researchers emphasized that there was no evidence Rodriguez knew Milgrim and Lischinsky worked for the Israeli Embassy or had selected them because of that affiliation. The paper states that he therefore could simply have been seeking to harm people he believed were Jewish. Milgrim was Jewish, while Lischinsky was not.

That distinction is central to the study’s framing analysis. The victims’ Israeli government employment gave news outlets a factual basis to describe them through an Israeli or geopolitical lens, even though the researchers found no evidence that their Embassy affiliation was known to the attacker when he targeted them.

Across three collections of coverage, including major U.S. newspapers and a broader LexisNexis sample, nationalist framing appeared frequently. The researchers also found that religious or antisemitism-related language appeared roughly two to five times farther into stories whose headlines used nationalist framing than in stories whose headlines used religious framing. They noted that readers who consumed only a headline or the opening portion of an article could therefore encounter the attack without seeing its Jewish or antisemitic dimension.

Federal lawmakers framed the killings differently. Among 369 comments examined by the researchers, 44% used only a religious or antisemitism frame and another 48% used both. Just 8% relied exclusively on nationalist framing.

Israel Framing Shifts Condemnation Toward Ambivalence

Taken together, the study finds that presenting violence against Jews through Israel or Zionism can materially change public reaction. The effect did not generally make respondents endorse anti-Jewish violence, but it weakened the near-consensus against it by moving more people toward ambivalence.

That finding is notable alongside the researchers’ media analysis. Israel-related framing appeared in more than one in five headlines about anti-Jewish hate crimes in their post-October 7 sample, while the Capital Jewish Museum case showed how victims’ Israeli affiliation could become a prominent element of coverage even when there was no evidence the attacker knew about that affiliation. The study concludes that such framing choices can affect how strongly the public condemns anti-Jewish violence.

A Michigan-based humanitarian organization whose board includes the father of U.S. Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed previously supported a Gaza charity whose leadership included operatives of the Popular Resistance Committees (PRC), an Israeli-designated terrorist organization that participated in the October 7, 2023 massacre. Bipartisan legislation introduced in the U.S. Senate would impose sanctions on the PRC and require a review of its eligibility for U.S. terrorist designation.

A July 2019 investigation by Israel’s Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center identified Life for Relief and Development (LIFE) as a supporter of Generosity Without Limit Association. The report documented extensive overlap between the Gaza charity’s leadership and the PRC, alongside evidence that humanitarian assistance distributed by the association also reached the terrorist faction.

The Washington Free Beacon reported on October 28 that El-Sayed’s father, Dr. Mohammed El-Sayed, an Eastern Michigan University engineering professor and imam, serves on LIFE’s board. Federal tax records establish his board membership since at least 2020, following the Gaza activities documented in the Israeli investigation.

Gaza Charity Operated Within Terrorist Faction’s Network

The Israeli report identified Generosity Without Limit’s general manager, Nairab, as a senior PRC operative in Rafah. Al-Nairab also headed the Bloc of the Bunyan Institutions for Charitable Activity, which investigators described as a network of charitable organizations affiliated with the PRC. The network included Generosity Without Limit and at least two other Gaza associations.

The investigation identified multiple additional leadership connections.

Generosity Without Limit chairman Muhammad Hilmi al-Arkan reportedly participated in a PRC delegation in February 2019. Deputy chairman Nihad al-Dahoudi appeared at ceremonies organized by the faction, including a memorial for an operative of its armed wing, where he wore a PRC insignia.

The association’s secretary, Munzir Shaqliya, had previously been identified as a senior PRC figure. Its public-relations official, Jibril Awda al-Soufi, was described as a senior PRC member who participated in a leadership delegation meeting the faction’s secretary-general.

These findings led Israeli researchers to characterize Generosity Without Limit as closely affiliated with the PRC, rather than merely sharing occasional activities with its members.

LIFE-Branded Aid and Distributions Through the PRC

The investigation also documented LIFE’s support for projects operated by Generosity Without Limit. Photographs from September 2017 show LIFE’s name and logo at a meat-distribution project organized by the Gaza charity. Additional photographs published on May 30, 2019, show senior association personnel standing alongside LIFE-branded food packages intended for Ramadan distribution.

Separately, on May 16, 2019, Generosity Without Limit published photographs of food packages distributed in Rafah. The PRC published identical photographs that day while announcing distributions to families of its dead and wounded operatives.

Israeli investigators interpreted the matching photographs as evidence that humanitarian assistance supplied to Generosity Without Limit was being distributed through the PRC. The report alleged that some humanitarian resources received by the association supported the faction’s armed apparatus.

October 7 Terror Group Faces Congressional Sanctions Proposal

The Popular Resistance Committees, whose armed wing is known as the Al-Nasser Salah al-Din Brigades, was designated a terrorist organization by Israel in September 2006. The PRC participated in the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attacks, claiming responsibility for operations that included capturing Israeli soldiers, according to congressional findings.

In March 2025, Republican Senator Pete Ricketts and Democratic Senator Adam Schiff introduced the bipartisan Accountability for Terrorist Perpetrators of October 7th Act, seeking sanctions against the PRC and associated entities and a review of its U.S. terrorism-designation status. It was also introcuced in the House by Congressman Brad Sherman.

The joint legislation also cites the PRC’s involvement in a 2003 attack on an American diplomatic convoy that killed three U.S. security guards and the 2004 murder of Israeli mother Tali Hatuel and her four daughters.

Additional Partnerships With Charities Later Linked to Hamas Financing

Jewish Onliner’s review identified two other historical LIFE partnerships not previously reported in relation to El-Sayed. Both involved charities that later faced government action over alleged financial support for Hamas-linked organizations.

German Charity Banned Over Hamas Support

A historical LIFE organizational profile records a partnership beginning in 2005 with Internationale Humanitäre Hilfsorganisation (IHH), a Germany-based charity subsequently banned in 2010 over financial support for Hamas-linked organizations.

In October 2023, the European Court of Human Rights upheld the legality of the prohibition. The judgment detailed approximately €2.5 million in financial support provided by IHH to Hamas-linked social organizations between 2006 and 2010, representing roughly half its funding activities. The court upheld German findings that IHH knowingly supported international terrorism, directly or indirectly.

The German organization was distinct from the Turkish humanitarian organization also known as İHH. LIFE’s historical profile identifies the German organization specifically, although it does not disclose the partnership’s financial value or duration.

Earlier Partnership With Qatar Charity

The same historical profile records the beginning of LIFE’s partnership with Qatar Charity in 2003.

Israel banned Qatar Charity, then known as the Qatar Charitable Society, in 2008, identifying it as a member of the Union of Good, a network accused of channeling financial support to Hamas. The connection was also described in U.S. federal court proceedings involving allegations of terrorism financing against Qatar Charity.

Monthes later, the U.S. Treasury designated the Union of Good as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist, identifying it as a network established by Hamas leadership to facilitate transfers to Hamas-controlled organizations, including payments supporting Hamas members and families of terrorist operatives

Previous U.S. Sanctions Settlement

LIFE’s overseas activities previously attracted federal scrutiny. As the Free Beacon reported, the organization agreed in 2015 to pay $780,000 to settle potential civil liability for apparent violations of U.S. sanctions on Saddam Hussein-era Iraq.

The Treasury Department’s enforcement notice identified three transfers totaling $236,000 between September 2002 and March 2003, routed through Jordan into Iraq despite restrictions on such transactions.

The historical records examined by Jewish Onliner extend the picture of LIFE’s overseas relationships beyond those Iraq transactions.

They document support for a Gaza charity embedded, according to Israeli investigators, within the organizational network of a terrorist faction that later participated in the October 7 massacre, alongside earlier partnerships with a German charity subsequently banned over Hamas financing and Qatar Charity, which Israel identified as part of the Hamas-linked Union of Good network. Mohammed El-Sayed, the father of a U.S. Senate candidate, serves on the charity’s board.

A single prolific Wikipedia editor made 17 changes to Democratic Michigan Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed’s biography between October 10 and November 1, during the final weeks before Election Day, according to Wikipedia’s revision history. The activity by the account CopyleftEverything was highlighted by NPOV Media founder Ashley Rindsberg, who described what appears to be a concentrated clean-up of El-Sayed’s page.

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Wikipedia records show CopyleftEverything has made 19 edits to the biography in total, with all but two occurring during that three-week period. The activity coincided with a surge in attention to the page. Rindsberg reported that El-Sayed’s biography received approximately 1.64 million views in October, consistent with Wikimedia pageview data.

Jewish Outreach Section Removed

One of the most consequential changes came on October 31, when CopyleftEverything removed 1,642 bytes concerning campaign Jewish outreach director Lenore Goldman. The edit history records the explanation as “removed Lenore section per talk.” Rindsberg characterized the deleted material as covering El-Sayed’s tensions with Michigan’s Jewish community and what he called the candidate’s “antisemitism problem.”

The removed passage linked the campaign’s Jewish outreach effort to disagreements over El-Sayed’s positions on Israel, U.S. military aid and his response to the March attack on Temple Israel in West Bloomfield. Federal investigators later assessed that attack as a “Hizballah-inspired act of terrorism” targeting the Jewish community. Following the attack, El-Sayed said that “hurt people hurt people.”

Hasan Piker Controversy Was “Cut Down”

According to Rindsberg’s analysis, another part of the apparent clean-up involved material concerning Hasan Piker. Rindsberg described the Piker controversy as having been “cut down.” An October 10 revision shows CopyleftEverything changing Piker’s description from a “controversial left-wing Twitch streamer and political commentator” to a “left-wing political commentator.” Material following that description remained, including references to criticism of Piker over statements involving September 11, Hamas and Israel.

The same revision added material about Kamala Harris and Barack Obama. CopyleftEverything wrote in the edit summary: “insanely funny to have 2 long paragraphs on Piker and none on Harris, Obama, or Trump.” It also added language saying Republican nominee Mike Rogers had asked AIPAC not to advertise openly because its brand was “too toxic.” Axios had reported that Rogers’s allies feared visible AIPAC support could become a political liability, but “too toxic” was CopyleftEverything’s wording rather than an Axios quotation.

Material Copied to Rogers Page Was Later Corrected

X user Yehuda Teitelbaum separately documented another episode involving the two candidates’ biographies. On November 1, CopyleftEverything copied material from El-Sayed’s Wikipedia page onto Rogers’s page, adding 1,967 bytes with the edit summary “from Abdul El-Sayed,” according to the page history. The copied paragraph said Rogers had claimed El-Sayed “pledged support” to the Muslim Brotherhood and that his campaign was funded by Muslim “terrorist groups.”

Less than three hours later, another editor revised the material, correcting the date and Rogers’s quotation to “terrorist groups like the Muslim Brotherhood.” The editor also removed a reference to Trump calling El-Sayed a “terrorist sympathizer” because it was “not in clip,” and removed the article’s characterization of Rogers’s response as “anti-Muslim rhetoric,” according to the edit summary.

Broader Editing Record

CopyleftEverything has nearly 12,000 Wikipedia edits and states on its user page: “I am interested in documenting left-of-center political groups and minor parties.” Rindsberg found particularly extensive editing of pages involving the Party for Socialism and Liberation, American Communist Party, Revolutionary Communists of America and Democratic Socialists of America chapters.

Teitelbaum also highlighted an October 15 discussion on Hasan Piker’s talk page. During a debate over descriptions of Zionism, CopyleftEverything wrote that distinguishing “nationalist” from “supremacist” seemed like “quibbling between ‘White nationalist’ and ‘White supremacist’ when the two beliefs correlate tightly.”

El-Sayed’s page was also restricted during the editing period. Wikipedia’s protection log shows that since August 6 it has required “extended confirmed” access, preventing ordinary new or anonymous users from directly editing it. Rogers’s biography has no entries in its corresponding protection log.

The result was a concentrated stretch in which one established editor repeatedly shaped a candidate biography drawing more than a million views, while also carrying some of its language into pages covering El-Sayed’s opponent and the wider Senate race.

Abdul El-Sayed, Michigan’s Democratic Senate nominee, is scheduled to appear at the Arab America Foundation’s CONNECT Empowerment Summit on November 6–7 in Chantilly, Virginia. The program also includes Chicago educator Fadi Abughoush, who praised slain Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar on Instagram with the words “Rest well King,” as reported by the Free Beacon.

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The Arab America Foundation lists Qatar-based businessman Hussam Abu Issa as a board member. He was also listed as a member of Al-Balagh Cultural Association’s founding board alongside Yusuf al-Qaradawi in rules approved in 1998. Qaradawi was widely described as the Muslim Brotherhood’s spiritual leader and endorsed Palestinian suicide bombings against Israelis.

According to the summit’s schedule, El-Sayed is a guest during Friday’s cultural evening at the Westfields Marriott Washington Dulles. Abughoush appears earlier that day on the education panel “We are All Educators: Changing Hearts, Changing Minds, One Conversation at a Time.” The two are listed for separate sessions.

Summit Speaker Who Eulogized Hamas Leader Yahya Sinwar

Fadi Abughoush, a Chicago-based educator identified as an “Arabic Education Innovator, Chicago Public Schools,” is scheduled to speak on the summit’s education panel, titled “We are All Educators: Changing Hearts, Changing Minds, One Conversation at a Time.”

Abughoush has published social media posts supporting Hamas, including a tribute to its leader Yahya Sinwar. A screenshot of his October 21, 2024, Instagram post under the handle “fabughoush” shows a drawing identifying Sinwar with the caption “Rest well King.”

In an October 21, 2026 report, FDD documented an October 7, 2023 post in which Abughoush shared a graphic contrasting Israeli military equipment with a Hamas assault glider. The graphic questioned why Israeli military action was called self-defense while Hamas’s assault was called terrorism.

A second screenshot shows his January 22, 2024 post featuring a cartoon headed “KOSHER,” depicting Benjamin Netanyahu eating human remains, with a child’s body on the table. FDD’s Brandy Shufutinsky had also discussed the Sinwar tribute and Netanyahu cartoon in written testimony submitted to a House Education and Workforce subcommittee on September 10, 2025.

Qatar Foundation International Honored Abughoush and Supported His School

Abughoush chairs the world languages department at Lindblom Math & Science Academy. Qatar Foundation International named him a recipient of its 2023 Arabic Teacher Excellence Award in an April 30, 2024 announcement, months before the Sinwar tribute. QFI said recipients were selected through an external blind review of their teaching and professional contributions.

QFI identified itself as a U.S.-based member of Qatar Foundation, which was established in 1995 by Qatar’s then-ruler, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, and Sheikha Moza bint Nasser. A 2020 profile documented QFI’s support for Abughoush through grants, resources and school trips. “QFI has done a lot for us, and especially for me,” he told the organization. The profile described student visits to Doha, Amman and Morocco.

A July 11, 2025 QFI grant agreement cited in FDD’s October report approved $154,104.09 for Lindblom’s Arabic program during the 2025–26 school year, including $140,094.63 budgeted for an unnamed Arabic teacher’s salary and benefits. The agreement does not identify Abughoush as that teacher. QFI announced on June 5, 2026, that it had concluded operations after more than 17 years.

Arab America Foundation Board Member Served With Muslim Brotherhood Spiritual Leader al-Qaradawi

Hussam Abu Issa, listed as a board member of the Arab America Foundation, is vice chairman of Doha-based Salam International Investment. His company’s Arabic biography confirms that he formerly served on Al-Balagh’s board.

Article 27 of the association’s founding rules, published on Qatar’s Al Meezan legal portal, names Hussam Abdulsalam Abu Issa and Yusuf Abdullah al-Qaradawi among nine initial directors.

Reuters described Qaradawi as a spiritual guide to the Muslim Brotherhood. A December 2001 report on his own website quoted his defense of suicide attacks against Israelis, including the claim, translated from Arabic: “Israeli society is entirely military; there are no civilians in it.”

An August 30, 2001 Saudi Press Agency dispatch published by Al-Jazirah identified Qaradawi as head of the Union of Good. The U.S. Treasury designated the coalition under Executive Order 13224 in November 2008, saying Hamas leaders had created it to transfer money to Hamas-controlled organizations. Treasury said some of the money was used to pay families of suicide bombers.

Further Controversy Surrounding El-Sayed’s Senate Campaign

The findings add to the controversies surrounding El-Sayed as he campaigns for Michigan’s open U.S. Senate seat. As Jewish Onliner recently reported, his half-sister, Eman Abdelhadi, wrote in a 2012 social media post that their mother had participated in Muslim Brotherhood activism while attending college in the early 1970s. The post was identified after El-Sayed denied on NBC’s Meet the Press on October 11 that he or his family had ties to the organization.

A new report published by Israel’s Misgav Institute for National Security and Zionist Strategy challenges the portrayal of U.S. military aid to Israel as an exceptionally costly American security commitment, documenting substantially higher expenditures on military deployments and infrastructure supporting other U.S. allies. The October 27 analysis, authored by Noam Yakoby, compares Israel’s regular $3.3 billion in annual U.S. military financing, plus $500 million for joint missile defense, with historical estimates of $29.1 billion in annual American military presence costs in Europe, $5.2 billion in Japan and $3.3 billion in South Korea.

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Unlike those treaty allies, Israel does not host a comparable permanent American combat force. Yakoby argues that U.S. assistance instead supports Israel’s independent military capabilities while providing Washington with intelligence, defense technology, regional deterrence and other strategic benefits. The report acknowledges that overseas military deployments also serve independent American objectives and that their costs are not directly interchangeable with foreign military assistance.

Billions Spent on American Forces in Europe and Asia

According to the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), the United States spent approximately $29.1 billion maintaining its military presence in Europe in 2018, including personnel, bases and deterrence initiatives. An additional $6.74 billion in NATO-related expenditures brought the estimate of direct American spending on European defense to approximately $35.8 billion that year.

In East Asia, a 2021 Government Accountability Office report documented $20.9 billion in Pentagon obligations for Japan and $13.4 billion for South Korea between 2016 and 2019, averaging approximately $5.2 billion and $3.3 billion annually, respectively. During that period, Japan contributed $12.6 billion and South Korea $5.8 billion in financial and in-kind support, offsetting portions of the costs associated with American deployments.

The Misgav report identifies approximately 80,000 U.S. troops assigned or deployed to NATO countries in Europe in 2024, alongside roughly 60,000 personnel in Japan and 25,000 in South Korea. Israel, by contrast, maintains its own military without a comparable permanent American combat deployment. Israel also spent approximately 8.8% of its GDP on defense in 2024, compared with NATO-wide defense expenditures of 2.65% of combined GDP. Before the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led terrorist attack, Israel’s defense spending stood at 4.4% of GDP in 2022.

Overseas Military Bases Carry Additional Costs

A 2024 Congressional report identified at least 128 U.S. military bases overseas across 51 countries. For fiscal year 2023, it identified approximately $5.4 billion in military construction budget authority for commands outside the continental United States, including projects in Hawaii and Guam, alongside approximately $27.8 billion in overseas operations and related expenses. Using these figures, Yakoby calculates a rough gross estimate of $33.2 billion, or $32.5 billion after subtracting certain reported host-country contributions, although the underlying spending categories are not fully comparable.

A separate Quincy Institute analysis estimated overseas basing costs at approximately $55 billion annually, rising to roughly $80 billion when personnel expenditures were included. While calculated using different methodologies, the estimates demonstrate the substantial costs of American military commitments recorded outside traditional foreign assistance budgets.

Military Aid to Israel Also Supports U.S. Defense Industries

Under the current U.S.-Israel Memorandum of Understanding, Washington provides $3.3 billion annually through Foreign Military Financing and an additional $500 million for joint missile defense cooperation, supporting programs including Iron Dome, David’s Sling and Arrow.

Yakoby emphasizes that much of this assistance finances American-produced military equipment. Historically, roughly three-quarters of Israel’s Foreign Military Financing was required to be spent on U.S. goods and services, with the remaining offshore procurement exception being phased out by 2028. The spending supports American defense contractors, manufacturing facilities and production lines, although the report acknowledges that these industrial benefits do not eliminate the fiscal cost of the assistance.

The analysis also accounts for extraordinary wartime assistance. Following the October 7 attack, Congress approved an additional $8.7 billion in military financing and missile defense funding in April 2024, bringing fiscal year 2024 appropriations for these programs to approximately $12.5 billion.

Intelligence, Technology and Battlefield Experience

Beyond financial considerations, Yakoby identifies significant strategic returns for the United States through intelligence sharing, technological development and Israeli combat experience. In May 2026, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence reported legislation describing Israel as a critical American security partner whose defense and intelligence capabilities contribute to U.S. operational effectiveness and technological superiority.

The report documents American adoption of Israeli-developed military technologies, including the Trophy and Iron Fist active protection systems for armored vehicles, F-35 components and advanced communications equipment. It also identifies lessons from Israeli military operations that have informed American military research and training.

An April 2026 U.S. Army study examined Israeli battlefield medicine and casualty evacuation practices, while a September 2025 Army analysis drew lessons from Israeli operations against Hamas’ tunnel infrastructure in Gaza. Yakoby argues that this operational experience, alongside Israel’s capabilities against Iranian military threats, strengthens American military preparedness and regional deterrence.

Assessing the Strategic Value of U.S. Aid to Israel

With the current U.S.-Israel military assistance agreement set to expire in September 2028, Yakoby argues that future negotiations should account for the full costs and strategic benefits of American security partnerships rather than evaluating aid to Israel in isolation. The report emphasizes that Israel’s independent military capabilities, intelligence cooperation, defense innovation and contributions to regional deterrence provide Washington with returns that extend beyond the financial value of military assistance.

While the analysis does not advocate maintaining current aid levels indefinitely and acknowledges growing support for gradually phasing out assistance, it argues that any changes should be evaluated against the costs and benefits of alternative American security arrangements. Yakoby concludes that U.S. military aid to Israel is considerably less exceptional when examined alongside Washington’s broader global defense commitments.

The Qatar-based International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS), identified by a French government report as part of the international Muslim Brotherhood organization and described as the Brotherhood’s “transnational scholarly authority” in testimony submitted to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee in August 2026, has called for ongoing political coordination among Muslim leaders and the establishment of unity committees in Muslim communities worldwide, including Western countries.

The October 28–30 Istanbul conference brought together European Islamic leaders, Syrian government representatives and a U.S.-sanctioned Hamas figure. Among its opening speakers was Abdallah Ben Mansour, president of the Council of European Muslims, whom the French government identifies as Europe’s representative on the international Muslim Brotherhood’s Shura Council.

Organizers also advertised Texas-based scholar Yasir Qadhi, chairman of the Fiqh Council of North America, in promotional material featuring the American flag. His attendance has not been independently confirmed. Qadhi previously identified himself as an IUMS member.

Conference Calls for Global Political Coordination

The conference’s October 30 closing declaration called for establishing a ‘Unity Center for Studies and Unity and Renaissance Projects,’ alongside unity committees in Muslim-majority countries and Muslim communities in non-Muslim countries.

It also emphasized the central importance of Al-Aqsa Mosque and coordinated efforts to advance its cause.

It further called for converting political-cooperation recommendations into concrete programs, appointing institutional contacts and holding regular meetings to evaluate implementation.

The political dimension was explicit in the conference’s workshops. One examined “political unity and a common economic market,” including Al-Aqsa’s role in strengthening Muslim political unity. Another focused on cooperation among Islamic movements and civil-society organizations.

French Government Identifies IUMS as Brotherhood Structure

A May 2025 French Interior Ministry report describes IUMS as “a structure belonging to the international organization of the Muslim Brotherhood.”

On page 29, the same report identifies Abdallah Ben Mansour as representing Europe within the Shura Council of the International Organization of the Muslim Brotherhood.

It also documents overlapping leadership between Brotherhood structures and the Council of European Muslims, formerly the Federation of Islamic Organisations in Europe (FIOE). Fouad Alaoui, another senior European council figure, is identified as a member of IUMS’s International Council since December 2023.

IUMS confirmed Ben Mansour’s participation among its opening speakers and published video of his address.

Another senior IUMS official, Wanis al-Mabrouk, has longstanding connections to European Islamic institutions. A 2008 interview identified him as head of education and outreach at the Federation of Islamic Organisations in Europe (FIOE), alongside previous positions at Islamic institutions in Britain. At Istanbul, he moderated the workshop on coordinating Islamic movements and civil-society institutions.

As Jewish Onliner previously reported, European-linked al-Mabrouk was among 15 scholars named in the organization's fatwa, dated March 28, 2025 and published April 1, calling for armed jihad against Israel.

IUMS president Ali al-Qaradaghi chaired the committee responsible for that ruling. Its secretary, Fadl Abdullah Murad, chaired a session on education and reform at the Istanbul gathering.

U.S.-Sanctioned Hamas Figure Among Conference Speakers

The opening session also featured Marwan Abu Ras, chairman of IUMS’s Jerusalem and Palestine Committee. On May 19, 2026, the U.S. Treasury sanctioned Abu Ras for having acted or purported to act on behalf of Hamas.

Treasury reported that senior Hamas leaders established a religious umbrella organization in Gaza in 2014 and appointed Abu Ras to lead it, aligning religious messaging with Hamas ideology.

It also identified former Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar as directing Abu Ras’s activities, including instructing him to maintain positions in other organizations on Hamas’s behalf.

Another opening speaker, Azzam al-Ayyoubi, served as secretary-general of Lebanon's Jamaa al-Islamiya from 2016 to 2022. The organization, including its Al-Fajr Forces armed wing, was designated a Foreign Terrorist Organization by the United States in January 2026.

Earlier IUMS Statement Proposed Parliamentary and Military Unification

The conference followed a broader political-unification proposal attributed to IUMS and published by the Muslim Brotherhood’s official website in March 2026.

The statement, bearing the names of al-Qaradaghi and IUMS Secretary-General Ali al-Sallabi, called for an EU-style strategic alliance among Muslim-majority countries.

It proposed political, economic, military, social and judicial committees, with the ultimate objective of unifying the Muslim world politically, parliamentarily, economically and militarily.

The statement identified Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Qatar among countries capable of advancing the initiative.

Syria Presents Religious-Unification Model

Syria’s religious affairs minister, Mohammad Abu al-Khair Shukri, also attended the conference and presented Damascus’s Charter for the Unity of Islamic Discourse as a model for religious coordination.

According Shukri, more than 1,800 scholars signed the charter, which was introduced on February 16, 2026.

Syria’s grand mufti, Osama al-Rifai, is also identified by IUMS as a member of its Board of Trustees, establishing an existing leadership connection with Syria’s religious establishment.

After the Summit

The Istanbul conference adopted its closing declaration, but the separate international Unity Charter remains unfinished. Indonesia’s Muhammadiyah organization, whose representative joined the drafting committee, confirmed that participants agreed on the charter’s principal ideas on October 29 and planned to finalize the document remotely during November.

The declaration already establishes an agenda for continued international political and institutional coordination. The leadership, participating organizations and implementation arrangements for its proposed committees, including those serving Muslim communities in Western countries, have not yet been publicly disclosed.

A two-day summit scheduled for November 13–14 in Brooklyn will train Muslim Student Association (MSA) and Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) leaders to develop campus organizing plans, coordinate activities across New York schools and connect with advocacy organizations offering internships. The event is being hosted by the Muslim American Society (MAS) Youth Center, part of a national organization founded by members of the Muslim Brotherhood, alongside the Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM), which previously worked with a U.S.-sanctioned terrorist fundraising network.

The NY MSA-SJP Summit, organized by MAS Youth Center in collaboration with MSA National, Oaktree Institute and PYM, is being promoted as a ten-hour certification course intended to build a unified Islamic student movement across New York. Organizers say participants will develop written annual plans for their chapters, share programming strategies and establish relationships with student organizations at other schools. The conference also includes internship opportunities with organizations working in advocacy, law, media and community organizing.

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The summit’s host and partners have documented histories involving the Muslim Brotherhood and organizations linked to designated terrorist groups. MAS has published educational materials praising Muslim Brotherhood founder Hassan al-Banna and the movement’s late spiritual leader Yusuf al-Qaradawi, while PYM previously co-organized activities with Samidoun, which the U.S. Treasury sanctioned for financing the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). The summit’s keynote speaker, workshop instructors and participating campus chapters have not yet been publicly identified.

Summit Host’s Muslim Brotherhood Origins

The Muslim American Society was established in the early 1990s by members of the Muslim Brotherhood. A 2004 Washington Post investigation identified Mohammed Mahdi Akef, who subsequently became the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood’s supreme guide, among its founders. Akef acknowledged his involvement in establishing MAS in an interview with the Chicago Tribune.

A January 2026 study by George Washington University’s Program on Extremism, authored by Sergio Altuna and Lorenzo Vidino, revisited the organization’s origins and documented historical and ideological relationships with the Brotherhood. The researchers also identified evidence of continuing transnational relationships involving Brotherhood members and American institutions.

The Muslim Students Association movement also has historical connections to Brotherhood networks. The Washington Post reported that Brotherhood activists were among those who established the MSA in 1963.

MAS Educational Materials Praise Brotherhood Leaders

The national organization’s historical roots are accompanied by educational publications praising prominent Brotherhood figures. A MAS booklet titled Muslim Revivalists, prepared for students and parents, features Hassan al-Banna among exemplary Islamic revivalists. It praises his movement as one of the most successful modern Islamic revival efforts and describes his advocacy for gradually introducing reforms that would bring society and government into conformity with Sharia.

The booklet also devotes several pages to Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the late cleric widely described as the Muslim Brotherhood’s spiritual leader. It praises his scholarship and explicitly credits his Brotherhood involvement with helping him communicate with wider audiences. Qaradawi publicly endorsed Palestinian suicide bombings against Israelis and chaired the Union of Good, which the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned in November 2008 for transferring funds to Hamas. A separate 2009 Treasury letter, reproduced in a State Department diplomatic cable, identified Qaradawi as the organization’s chairman.

A separate MAS educational packet, hosted in its September 2024 upload directory, includes a resource guide based on Yusuf al-Qaradawi's Sincerity: The Essential Quality, which MAS Youth translated and adapted.. The packet provides facilitator notes, discussion questions and activities for youth and young adults, including instructions for organizing single-session or multiweek educational programs. Its teaching materials also quote Hassan al-Banna on sincerity and the responsibilities of Islamic activists.

MAS-affiliated institutions in New York have also hosted speakers with direct professional relationships to Brotherhood leaders. In October 2022, Akram Kassab, a former director of Qaradawi’s office, spoke at a workshop at the MAS-affiliated Andalusia Islamic Center, co-sponsored by MAS and American Muslims for Palestine. Kassab previously served as secretary-general of the Association of Qaradawi’s Students and identified himself in a 2016 Arabic interview as a founding member of the International Union of Muslim Scholars, which Qaradawi chaired.

Palestinian Youth Movement Previously Worked With Sanctioned PFLP Sham Charity

PYM, an announced partner in the summit, has a documented history of organizing events alongside Samidoun, a network identified by the U.S. government as an international fundraiser for the PFLP. According to an October 2024 NGO Monitor investigation, PYM and Samidoun co-sponsored demonstrations, organized events and promoted each other’s activities. Among them was an August 2020 demonstration in New York, co-hosted by the two organizations, where participants displayed Hezbollah and PFLP flags.

In January 2022, PYM, Samidoun and Within Our Lifetime also jointly launched a campaign supporting Somaya Falah, who had been arrested by Israeli authorities on security-related charges. Their cooperation was independently documented in a June 2024 Arabic-language NoonPost article, which identified Samidoun among PYM’s organizational partners and described their joint protest and cultural activities.

On October 15, 2024, the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned Samidoun, identifying it as a front organization established by the PFLP that provided financial support to the designated terrorist group. Treasury simultaneously sanctioned Khaled Barakat, identifying him as a member of the PFLP’s leadership abroad whose fundraising and recruitment efforts supported its activities.

New York SJP Chapters Previously Co-Sponsored Samidoun Events

Several New York SJP chapters have also participated in activities alongside Samidoun. According to the Anti-Defamation League, the SJP chapters at Baruch College, John Jay College and the City College of New York, alongside Hunter College’s Palestine Solidarity Alliance, co-sponsored a September 3, 2024, demonstration with Samidoun.

The protest targeted Baruch College’s Hillel organization. The ADL reported that Jewish students were harassed and a Hillel staff member was assaulted during the demonstration.

An earlier Arabic-language declaration, published in May 2020, also listed John Jay College SJP, NYU SJP, National SJP, PYM, Within Our Lifetime and Samidoun among organizations endorsing a campaign to isolate the Palestinian Authority leadership and reject the Oslo peace framework.

MAS NYC Co-Director Called for Hamas to “Strike Tel Aviv”

The summit’s Brooklyn host has also faced scrutiny over public statements by its leadership. Abdullah Akl, identified by MAS New York as its co-director of public affairs and civic engagement and also an organizer associated with Within Our Lifetime, previously led a rally chant calling on Hamas to “strike Tel Aviv,” according to an October 2025 investigation by the Washington Free Beacon.

The same investigation documented an April 2025 prayer by Mohammad Badawy, whom the outlet identified as MAS Youth Center's resident scholar, calling for the “destruction of the illegitimate Zionist occupiers and all of their supporters” and expressing support for “all those resisting against them by any means necessary.”

Summit to Coordinate Student Chapters Across New York

The conference, themed Rewriting the Syllabus of the Student Movement, will take place at MAS Youth Center in Brooklyn. According to the organizers, last year’s summit attracted more than 130 student leaders from over 40 schools. This year’s program includes a keynote, organizing workshops, chapter consultations, internship opportunities and a certification ceremony.

An upcoming Orthodox Christians for Palestine (OCP) summit near Washington, D.C., will feature a convicted former CIA officer who now hosts a Russian state-media program, speakers associated with sanctioned organizations, and an Orthodox nun who publicly defended Hamas.

The Not in Christ’s Name summit, scheduled for November 14 at Saints Peter and Paul Antiochian Orthodox Church in Potomac, Maryland, will feature keynote speaker John Kiriakou, who was imprisoned for leaking a covert CIA officer’s identity and has called the Houthis “freedom fighters.”

Other advertised participants include Columbia activist Mohsen Mahdawi, whose immigration case filings cited allegations that he claimed to have made guns for Hezbollah; attorney Jonathan Kuttab, co-founder of Israeli-designated Al-Haq; Mother Agapia Stephanopoulos, who said “Hamas is not the problem”; and Tor Stumo, a flotilla participant whose movement’s steering committee includes a U.S.-sanctioned organizer.

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OCP also identifies Archbishop Theodosios Atallah Hanna, who has met senior Hamas and Hezbollah figures and defended Bashar al-Assad, among the clerics from whom it takes “guidance.”

The conference will serve as preparation for a November 16 congressional advocacy day, with afternoon sessions devoted to lobbying lawmakers, organizing church communities and mobilizing younger activists.

Keynote Speaker’s Russian State-Media Career

Kiriakou, a former CIA counterterrorism officer, currently hosts The Deep State on Russian state-controlled RT, following years of employment at Sputnik, another Kremlin-funded media organization. His relationship with Russian state media dates to August 2017, when he joined Sputnik Radio and began co-hosting Loud & Clear alongside Brian Becker, co-founder of the ANSWER Coalition and a leading figure in the Party for Socialism and Liberation.

In a 2018 investigation titled The CIA Spy Who Became a Russian Propagandist, The New Republic examined Kiriakou’s work for Sputnik and the Russian government’s recruitment of American commentators across the political spectrum. His association with Russian state media continued into 2026 through RT’s The Deep State, a program covering American foreign policy, intelligence agencies and international conflicts.

In September and October 2026, the program featured a multi-part interview with Viktor Bout, the Russian arms trafficker convicted in the United States in 2011 of conspiring to provide weapons to Colombia’s FARC terrorist organization for use against Americans.

RT itself has faced extensive U.S. counterintelligence and sanctions actions. In September 2024, the Treasury Department sanctioned senior RT executives, accusing the outlet of secretly recruiting and paying American social-media personalities to distribute Kremlin-backed political messaging while concealing Russian involvement. Treasury also identified RT deputy editor-in-chief Anton Anisimov as conducting activities on behalf of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB).

Days later, the State Department disclosed findings that RT had developed cyber capabilities linked to Russian intelligence and was involved in covert influence operations and procurement of military equipment for Russian forces fighting in Ukraine.

Kiriakou has also publicly defended Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthi movement, whose armed organization, Ansar Allah, was designated a Foreign Terrorist Organization by the United States in March 2025. During the September 22, 2026, episode of John Kiriakou’s Briefing Room, he declared, “I believe that the Houthis are actually freedom fighters.”

During an April 2026 interview with Tucker Carlson, Kiriakou also incorrectly suggested that Hamas had only recently been designated a terrorist organization by the United States, possibly during one of President Donald Trump’s administrations. Hamas has been on the U.S. Foreign Terrorist Organization list since October 1997. Kiriakou further claimed that Hamas had never carried out terrorist attacks against Americans, despite the State Department reporting that 46 Americans were killed in the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, attacks.

Kiriakou’s federal criminal conviction stemmed from leaking classified information identifying CIA personnel involved in sensitive counterterrorism operations. According to the U.S. Justice Department, he disclosed to a journalist the full name of an undercover CIA officer whose association with the agency had remained classified for more than 20 years, along with information connecting the officer to the CIA’s Rendition, Detention, and Interrogation Program.

He also disclosed identifying information about another CIA officer involved in the 2002 capture of al-Qaeda operative Abu Zubaydah. Prosecutors said a journalist subsequently passed information to an investigator assisting the defense of Guantánamo Bay detainees, enabling the second CIA officer to be secretly photographed and his photograph shown to detainees. Kiriakou pleaded guilty in October 2012 to intentionally disclosing a covert officer’s identity and was sentenced to 30 months in federal prison in January 2013.

His international political contacts extend beyond Russia. According to Foreign Agents Registration Act filings, the U.S. representation of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) met Kiriakou face-to-face on March 11, 2026, following an earlier meeting on April 23, 2025. The contacts were highlighted in an August 2026 Daily Wire investigation, which identified other American media personalities approached by the Turkish political operation.

OCP Takes Guidance From Archbishop With Decades of Hamas, Hezbollah and Iranian Connections

In its published guiding principles, OCP explicitly identifies Archbishop Theodosios Atallah Hanna, the Greek Orthodox Archbishop of Sebastia, among the Christian religious figures from whom it takes guidance. An October 2026 report about OCP’s upcoming summit also featured an extensive interview with Hanna.

Hanna’s public engagement with designated terrorist organizations dates back more than two decades. In August 2001, following Israel’s assassination of PFLP Secretary-General Abu Ali Mustafa, Hanna praised the slain terrorist leader, extended condolences to his family and the PFLP, and described his death as a major loss for the Palestinian people. The Palestinian news agency WAFA quoted Hanna praising Mustafa’s principles, positions and sacrifices, saying that he would remain alive in the memory of Palestinians and the Arab nation.

In August 2002, Hanna was detained and questioned by Israeli authorities over allegations involving support for terrorist organizations and unauthorized travel to Lebanon and Syria. According to an archived report in Lebanon’s As-Safir newspaper, Hanna acknowledged meeting Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah during his visit to Lebanon, describing the encounter as having taken place on the sidelines of a Christian-Muslim dialogue conference.

In a December 2007 interview with Kuwait’s Al-Rai newspaper, Hanna explicitly advocated cooperation with Hamas and Hezbollah. The newspaper quoted him describing both as Islamic movements that Christians should work with because of shared interests. The published Arabic text states that Hamas and Hezbollah were movements “that we serve and must cooperate with.”

Hanna’s contacts extended to senior Hamas officials and representatives of the Iranian leadership. In October 2008, he attended the sixth conference of the International Jerusalem Foundation in Doha, Qatar, where he sat at the same dinner table as Hamas leaders Khaled Mashal and Mousa Abu Marzouk, Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s adviser Ali Akbar Velayati, and Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the influential Muslim Brotherhood-associated cleric. The gathering was documented on Qaradawi’s official website, which identified Hanna and the other participants by name.

The archbishop continued participating in events organized by Iranian institutions. In August 2012, Hanna delivered a recorded address to an Iranian Embassy Jerusalem Day gathering in Jordan. According to the Jordanian news outlet JO24, an Iranian flag was visible beside Hanna in the recording, which featured praise for Iran, its leadership and former Supreme Leader Ruhollah Khomeini. Hanna reportedly argued that the wider Islamic world supported Iran’s leadership because of its position on Jerusalem.

His relationship with the Syrian government was similarly public. Hanna visited Damascus in 2017 and met President Bashar al-Assad, later describing the meeting as “wonderful” in a December 2018 interview with the Syrian newspaper Al-Watan. During that interview, Hanna praised Assad’s leadership and the Syrian army, characterized the uprising against the regime as a foreign-backed conspiracy, and expressed support for a Syrian victory under Assad.

In December 2019, Hanna publicly defended Hezbollah and Nasrallah after Greek Orthodox Metropolitan Elias Audi criticized them in a sermon in Beirut. In a recorded statement published by Hezbollah-affiliated Al-Ahed, Hanna rejected the criticism and asserted that Hezbollah and Nasrallah had played a role in defending Christian communities in Syria and elsewhere in the Middle East. He described the remarks against them as unacceptable and said they did not represent Orthodox Christians.

Hanna also delivered a recorded address to the Arab Nationalist Guard’s December 2021 conference in Lebanon. The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace previously identified the Arab Nationalist Guard among the armed militias supporting Bashar al-Assad’s government during Syria’s civil war. According to Al-Ahed’s coverage, the conference was attended by Hezbollah Political Council Deputy Chairman Mahmoud Qamati, a representative of Iran’s embassy in Lebanon and other political figures. The gathering included a speech by the militia’s commander praising Nasrallah, Iran and the late Iranian Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani, as well as a ceremony swearing in new members.

In April 2022, Hanna participated in an Iranian-organized virtual conference marking Jerusalem Day alongside senior figures from Hezbollah, the Houthis, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the PFLP. The participants included Nasrallah, Haniyeh, Ziyad al-Nakhala and Talal Naji, according to Israel Hayom. Later that year, Hanna also gave an exclusive interview to the official Arabic-language website of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, discussing Christian-Muslim solidarity and support for the Palestinian cause.

Most recently, in February 2025, Hanna issued a tribute to Nasrallah ahead of the Hezbollah leader’s funeral. In a message published by Al-Ahed, Hanna described the funeral as a momentous event and expressed reverence for Nasrallah’s sacrifices and those of his associates. According to a translation reported by JNS, Hanna wrote that Palestinians stood in “reverence and honor for the sacrifices made by Sayyed Hassan and his companions.” JNS reported that Israeli police opened an investigation into the letter, citing Israel’s Kan public broadcaster.

Columbia Activist Faced Allegations of Threats Against Jews and Hezbollah Weapons Claims

Mohsen Mahdawi, a Columbia University pro-Palestine activist, is scheduled to speak on the summit’s fifth panel, Mobilizing the Next Generation. Mahdawi was detained by federal immigration authorities in April 2025. During his immigration case, the federal government cited a 2015 Vermont police report containing allegations that he made violent antisemitic statements, sought access to firearms and claimed to have manufactured weapons for Hezbollah.

According to the report, a gun-shop owner alleged that Mahdawi claimed experience manufacturing modified 9mm submachine guns used to kill Jews in Palestine. The report also recorded an allegation that he said he had previously made guns for Hezbollah. A second witness reportedly told police that Mahdawi said, “I like to kill Jews.” The allegations were presented in federal immigration proceedings and subsequently discussed in a July 2026 federal appellate decision.

Separately, a September 2026 investigation by David Collier and Rachel Feldman documented historical Arabic-language social-media posts attributed to Mahdawi, including a 2010 statement threatening to annihilate Jews and a 2014 post praising the armed wings of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The researchers also identified posts honoring Palestinian militants and a December 2024 Arabic-language video in which Mahdawi placed his activism in the United States alongside armed resistance in Gaza and the West Bank. Jewish Insider independently checked the translations used in the investigation.

Mahdawi’s earlier political activities also included a documented leadership role in Fatah’s Shabiba student movement, whose wider membership has included individuals associated with the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades. An April 2013 Palestinian press report identified Mahdawi as a coordinator of Shabiba at Birzeit University, quoting him discussing internal student elections and appealing to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to intervene in disputes within the movement.

Shabiba operates as Fatah’s student wing and has included members also associated with the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, an armed Fatah-linked organization designated by the United States as a Foreign Terrorist Organization in 2002. A January 2023 report by the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center identified Ahmed Abu Juneid, who was killed during a confrontation with Israeli forces in Nablus, as an Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades operative. The report documented that Fatah’s Shabiba chapter at the Nablus branch of Al-Quds Open University had separately issued a mourning notice identifying him as one of its members.

Panel Moderator Founded Israeli-Designated Organization

Jonathan Kuttab, who will moderate the panel on the status of the Holy Land, is a co-founder of Al-Haq, a Palestinian organization designated by Israel’s Ministry of Defense in October 2021 over alleged organizational links to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a U.S.-designated terrorist organization. Israel accused Al-Haq and five other Palestinian organizations of operating on behalf of the PFLP, although nine.

In September 2025, the United States separately sanctioned Al-Haq under an executive order targeting activities involving the International Criminal Court, rather than under counterterrorism authorities. Kuttab maintained his institutional involvement with the organization after the Israeli designation, writing in a February 2022 blog post that he had visited Al-Haq’s Ramallah headquarters, met Executive Director Shawan Jabbarin and remained a member of its General Assembly.

Kuttab is also listed by Friends of Sabeel North America as president of the board of Holy Land Trust, a Bethlehem-based nonprofit. Palestinian electoral records and research published by NGO Monitor identify Holy Land Trust Executive Director Elias D’eis with DFLP-affiliated local electoral activity in Beit Sahour, including a municipal electoral slate in 2021. The Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine was removed from the U.S. Foreign Terrorist Organization list in 1999 but remains subject to U.S. counterterrorism sanctions.

Holy Land Trust founder Sami Awad previously acknowledged conducting nonviolence training for Hamas leaders and members of other terrorist organizations, according to remarks documented by NGO Monitor.

Another organization with which Kuttab is formally associated is Just Peace Advocates, a Canadian group that lists him as a board member. In March 2026, the organization explicitly called for Hezbollah’s removal from Canada’s terrorist list. Just Peace Advocates also co-sponsored a May 2022 webinar featuring Khaled Barakat, whom the U.S. Treasury later sanctioned in October 2024 for his role in the PFLP’s leadership and overseas fundraising operations.

These records document Kuttab’s governance roles within organizations that have maintained relationships with individuals and groups linked to designated terrorist organizations. The available records do not establish his personal involvement in the specific activities of those organizations.

Orthodox Nun Previously Defended Hamas

Mother Agapia Stephanopoulos, who will participate in the summit’s opening panel and moderate its final organizing session, has a history of public statements defending Hamas. In an August 11, 2025, interview with Tucker Carlson, Stephanopoulos characterized Hamas primarily as a movement defending Palestinian people and territory, declaring at one point, “Hamas is not the problem.” She also rejected characterizations of the organization as principally a jihadist movement, describing members she had encountered as people seeking to defend their communities.

Stephanopoulos is scheduled to participate in the opening panel, What the Tour Bus Won’t Show You: Voices from the Ground, before moderating Organizing & Activating Your Communities and Parishes, a session focused on mobilizing Orthodox churches and local communities.

Global Sumud Flotilla Participant Joins Youth Mobilization Panel

Tor Stumo, another participant in the youth-mobilization panel, took part in the 2025 Global Sumud Flotilla alongside his brother Adnaan. In an October 1, 2025, statement, CODEPINK identified the brothers as its “friends and valued co-organizers.” Both were subsequently detained by Israeli authorities after their vessels were intercepted and returned to the United States following their release.

The flotilla movement’s broader organizing network subsequently became the subject of U.S. counterterrorism sanctions targeting individuals and organizations accused of involvement with Hamas. On January 21, 2026, the Treasury Department sanctioned the Popular Conference for Palestinians Abroad, identifying it as a Hamas-directed organization involved in organizing flotillas to Gaza. Treasury stated that PCPA had been established with Hamas funding and that Hamas directed its activities through officials embedded within the organization’s leadership.

Summit Will Prepare Attendees for Congressional Advocacy

The summit’s remaining panels will address Christian Zionism, conditions facing Palestinian Christians and strategies for mobilizing churches and political organizations. Participants include Arab Center Washington DC executive director Tamara Kharroub, former U.S. Ambassador to Qatar Patrick Theros, A New Policy co-founder Tariq Habash, and representatives of the Friends Committee on National Legislation and American Friends Service Committee.

The published program specifically prepares attendees to request meetings with lawmakers and communicate with congressional staff ahead of a November 16 advocacy day on Capitol Hill. OCP also solicits event funding through Saints Peter and Paul’s church management platform, although its public materials do not disclose the summit’s complete funding sources or financial sponsors.

CAGE International’s October 26 launch of a new report on the U.S. national-security system brought together speakers whose backgrounds include work supporting an effort to remove Hamas from Britain’s terrorism list, public praise for cooperation among Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the PFLP and Hezbollah, and attendance at a Tehran conference run by an organization later sanctioned by the United States for supporting the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force.

The online event, chaired by CAGE Research Director Asim Qureshi, featured Raja Abdulhaq, Cyrus McGoldrick and researcher David Chmielewski. CAGE International is a UK-based advocacy organization focused on counterterrorism policies, detention and what it describes as abuses stemming from the post-9/11 “War on Terror.” The event launched CAGE’s report, The Spiralling War of Terror: How Trump Inherited the National Security Machine He Now Wields.

In an accompanying October 26 release, CAGE quoted Qureshi arguing that the national-security powers examined in the report should not simply be reformed. “These powers cannot be reformed, only abolished,” he said. Qureshi also linked opposition to ICE with the campaign against Guantánamo, saying activists were confronting “the same system” and calling for the movements to stand together.

Qureshi Backed Hamas Delistment Effort

One of the event’s speakers, CAGE Research Director Asim Qureshi, personally prepared expert reports for a legal application seeking to remove Hamas from Britain’s list of proscribed terrorist organizations. One report states that he was instructed by Riverway Law to provide evidence “in support of the application” to deproscribe Hamas. A second report argued that Palestinian violence should be understood within a history of anti-colonial resistance and described such violence as involving “legitimate reciprocity.”

Qureshi states in the reports that he prepared them in his personal capacity. CAGE, however, has separately said that it and Riverway Law submitted applications seeking Hamas’s removal from Britain’s proscription list.

At a 2006 Hizb ut-Tahrir rally in London, he praised Hezbollah’s performance against Israel and said Muslims had an obligation to support jihad in Chechnya, Iraq, Palestine, Kashmir and Afghanistan. When CNN later confronted him with footage of the speech, Qureshi confirmed that he was the speaker. The British government outlawed the organization in January 2024.

CAGE also acknowledges that its predecessor, Cageprisoners, repeatedly invited Anwar al-Awlaki, who later became a senior leader of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, to address fundraising dinners by video. CAGE’s own account says that by its 2009 fundraiser it knew of Awlaki’s 44 Ways to Support the Jihad.

More recently, written evidence submitted to Parliament by the Community Security Trust cited Qureshi saying at a January 2025 event that he would “want to join Palestine Action” if he were young. Palestine Action was subsequently proscribed in July 2025. Qureshi’s remarks preceded the ban.

Abdulhaq Praised The “Axis Of Resistance”

Another speaker at the October 26 event, Raja Abdulhaq, is president of the Tamkeen Movement, a former executive director of New York’s Islamic Leadership Council and a co-founder of Quds News Network, according to a published biography.

At the 2024 People’s Conference for Palestine, Abdulhaq delivered a presentation on the development of the “Axis of Resistance.” According to an Anti-Defamation League account, he praised the “amazing” cooperation among Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and Hezbollah. All four are U.S.-designated terrorist organizations.

Abdulhaq returned to the conference in 2025, where the ADL reported that he described the actions of Hamas, Hezbollah and PIJ as an “authentic indigenous response to a violent, colonial project.” He argued that “resistance” was necessary to overturn what he described as regional subjugation.

McGoldrick Spoke At Conference Run By Group Later Sanctioned Over IRGC Ties

A third speaker at the October 26 event, Cyrus McGoldrick, has a documented connection to a Tehran conference later tied by the U.S. Treasury to the IRGC-Quds Force. A curriculum vitae hosted by Istanbul’s Ibn Haldun University lists him as a presenter at the New Horizons Conference in Tehran in September 2014. McGoldrick later moved to Istanbul and studied at Ibn Haldun University.

In February 2019, more than four years after McGoldrick’s appearance, the U.S. Treasury designated the Iran-based New Horizon Organization under Executive Order 13224 for supporting the IRGC-Quds Force. Treasury said New Horizon’s international conferences provided Iranian intelligence officers with a platform to recruit and collect intelligence from foreign attendees and that organizers facilitated contact between IRGC-QF personnel and U.S. persons. Treasury also accused the organization of using its conferences to propagate antisemitism and Holocaust denial.

McGoldrick’s own biography says he previously worked as a director for CAIR-New York, the Coalition for Civil Freedoms and the Islamic Leadership Council of Metropolitan New York, and served in an advisory role with the Aafia Foundation. A current speakers’ profile says he continues “advising Islamic movements across the US and abroad” from Istanbul.

His background also overlaps institutionally with Abdulhaq’s. Both men have held positions with New York’s Islamic Leadership Council before appearing together on the October 26 CAGE panel.

Fourth Speaker Moved From Princeton Protests To CAGE

The fourth participant, David Chmielewski, was identified by CAGE as a researcher and author of the new report. Chmielewski graduated from Princeton in 2024 and participated in the university’s Gaza encampment and hunger strike. He later wrote that the protest had placed “Palestinian liberation” at the center of campus discourse.

The October 26 event therefore brought a relatively new U.S.-focused CAGE researcher together with three figures whose records intersect with legal efforts challenging terrorism designations, Palestinian “resistance” advocacy, older Islamist networks and, in McGoldrick’s case, a Tehran conference organization later sanctioned by the United States for supporting IRGC-Quds Force operations.

American Muslims for Palestine is preparing to hold its 19th annual Palestine Convention near Chicago with an explicit focus on converting changing American attitudes toward Israel into political power. Announced speakers include Track AIPAC co-founder Cory Archibald, Palestine Chronicle editor-in-chief Ramzy Baroud, whose outlet published a correspondent identified by the IDF as a Hamas operative who held three Israeli hostages, and New Jersey Democratic congressional nominee Adam Hamawy.

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AMP’s convention website says the November 26-28 gathering at the Tinley Park Convention Center is titled “Palestine: From Bearing Witness to Building Power.” The organization says “longstanding bipartisan support for Israel is fractured and on the verge of collapse” and calls on supporters to “pool our resources toward political and collective action.”

Adam Hamawy Volunteered With Charity Later Sanctioned Over Al-Qaeda Support

Convention speaker Adam Hamawy, a plastic surgeon and Democratic candidate for New Jersey’s 12th Congressional District, volunteered in Bosnia in 1994 with the Benevolence International Foundation, according to Jewish Insider, which obtained a 1996 Newark Star-Ledger interview with him. Hamawy said he spent five weeks with the organization, including time in Sarajevo and Zenica, assessing medical needs and delivering supplies. New Jersey’s candidate list identifies him as the Democratic candidate in the November 3 election.

In November 2002, the U.S. Treasury designated BIF and related entities as financiers of terrorism under Executive Order 13224. Treasury said BIF had provided support for and maintained links to al-Qaeda and its operatives, including logistical support to Mamdouh Mahmud Salim, a Bin Laden lieutenant present at al-Qaeda’s founding.

Hamawy also traveled with Omar Abdel-Rahman, the “Blind Sheikh,” during a 1991 trip to Detroit, served as his translator at a press conference and testified on Abdel-Rahman’s behalf during his 1995 trial. Abdel-Rahman was convicted that year of participating in a conspiracy to carry out terrorist attacks in New York.

Palestine Chronicle Editor Ramzy Baroud’s Hamas Connections

Another announced speaker, Ramzy Baroud, is editor-in-chief of the Palestine Chronicle. The outlet published numerous articles by Abdallah Aljamal, whom the IDF and Shin Bet identified as a Hamas operative who held Israeli hostages Almog Meir Jan, Andrey Kozlov and Shlomi Ziv in his family home in Nuseirat.

Palestine Chronicle’s own website lists Aljamal as a Gaza-based contributor and archives articles published under his name immediately before the June 8, 2024 rescue. One of his articles was published on June 7, a day before Israeli forces rescued the three hostages from the Aljamal family home.

Baroud has also publicly discussed Hamas involvement within his extended family. In a 2026 interview with Chris Hedges, he described a relative from the al-Badrasawi branch of his family who became head of the Northern Command of Hamas’s Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades. Baroud said the relative later fought during the battle for the Shati refugee camp, fired on an Israeli tank and then “blew himself up.”

Baroud’s publisher identifies the relative as Ehab al-Badrasawi. His book, Before the Flood, follows the al-Badrasawi family across several generations. A Publishers Weekly review says Ehab joined Hamas after the death of his younger brother Wael and that the account moves toward October 7 as Ehab’s son and nephew also “join the fight.”

Baroud Participated in 2015 ‘Third Intifada’ Seminar Alongside Hamas Officials

Baroud also participated in a 2015 seminar titled “The Third Intifada: Prospects and Challenges.” X researcher Leslie Kajomvitz documented records of the seminar and the report that followed, which included Baroud, Hamas officials and Ramy Abdu, founder and chairman of Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor.

Abdu and Euro-Med have themselves been identified by Israeli authorities as having Hamas ties. Israel’s Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism Ministry said in May 2026 that Euro-Med was headed by a Hamas operative, while a 2013 Israeli Defense Ministry list identified Abdu as a “main operative” associated with institutions Israel considered Hamas fronts in Europe. Euro-Med has rejected Israeli allegations of political or organizational affiliations as false.

The 2015 seminar also included Salama Marouf, then a senior official in Gaza’s Hamas-run Government Media Office. The report produced following the gathering called for a new “counter-Palestinian media” with the “capabilities and competencies to challenge the prevailing narratives in Western media,” according to the material documented by Kajomvitz.

Track AIPAC Co-Founder Works for PAC’s Largest Vendor

The convention will also feature Cory Archibald, co-founder of Track AIPAC. The Washington Free Beacon reported that Archibald has described herself as a Marxist and a “long-time American expat” who spent approximately 20 years living in the Middle East and Europe and was residing in Germany.

Archibald founded Citizens Against AIPAC Corruption, the political committee behind Track AIPAC. Federal Election Commission records identify Citizens Against AIPAC Corruption as an active hybrid PAC registered on May 16, 2024.

Campaign-finance records also show that the PAC’s largest operating vendor is a company where Archibald works. FEC-derived records covering January 2025 through October 14, 2026 list $213,987 in operating expenditures to C2G Strategies LLC. C2G’s website identifies Archibald as its Editorial Director and says she advises political candidates on communications, messaging and crisis management.

The PAC’s payments to C2G include recurring expenditures explicitly labeled as fundraising services. A February 2026 FEC filing reports a $16,272.73 payment for “Fundraising Services” on February 4 and a $5,371.22 entry for “In-Kind Fundraising Services” on February 11.

Track AIPAC also promoted a spreadsheet encouraging followers to boycott films and television projects associated with approximately 450 Jewish entertainment-industry figures who had publicly supported Israel, according to the Free Beacon. The outlet separately found that the X account now used by Track AIPAC previously operated as “California for Warren”, promoting Elizabeth Warren’s 2020 presidential campaign.

AMP’s convention website describes the November gathering as a transition from “bearing witness” toward building political power. “This is our moment,” the organization states.

Freedom Convoy USA, a pro-Palestine campaign traveling across the United States ahead of an October 26 arrival in Washington, D.C., is drawing support from a network that includes CODEPINK, Jewish Voice for Peace and CAIR-Chicago, while its media contact heads an organization that helped build communications for the Global Sumud Flotilla, a Jewish Onliner investigation found.

The campaign began in Los Angeles and is traveling thousands of miles across the country before concluding near the U.S. Capitol.The Palestinian Authority’s WAFA news agency reported October 22 that 42 people were participating.

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Hazami Barmada, identified by EFE as an organizer, previously helped lead prolonged demonstrations in Washington alongside Atefeh Rokhvand, founder of Teachers Against Genocide. An official CODEPINK announcement says CODEPINK Los Angeles and Jewish Voice for Peace Los Angeles supported the convoy’s launch. At an October 23 Chicago stop, promotional material for a “Community Solidarity Meet and Greet” with Freedom Convoy USA members displayed the CAIR-Chicago logo.

The convoy’s press contact, Gur Tsabar, heads Movement Media Hub, which earlier this year helped build the communications infrastructure for the Global Sumud Flotilla. That work occurred after the U.S. Treasury Department had sanctioned the Popular Conference for Palestinians Abroad, or PCPA, saying it acted on behalf of Hamas and was a main organizer of recent Gaza flotillas.

Veteran D.C. Activists Behind the Convoy

Barmada has been involved in Washington-area pro-Palestine demonstrations for years. EFE footage distributed through Reuters Connect identified her as an organizer when Freedom Convoy USA departed Los Angeles on October 17.

Before the convoy, Barmada worked closely with Rokhvand during a prolonged demonstration outside the Israeli Embassy in Washington. An August 2026 D.C. Court of Appeals decision describes both women as participants in the multi-month protest. An April 2024 press statement hosted on CAIR’s website identified Barmada as the organizer and media contact for the continuous demonstration.

Barmada and Rokhvand were later credited with the idea for a November 2025 street-theater installation at Washington’s Union Station depicting Israeli and American political figures at a meal involving blood and human body parts. Jewish organizations, including the American Jewish Committee, condemned the imagery as invoking the historic antisemitic blood libel.

The Anti-Defamation League subsequently identified Barmada and Rokhvand as leaders of a March 2026 White House demonstration in which participants wearing masks depicting President Donald Trump, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Jeffrey Epstein pantomimed consuming babies and drinking blood. Material displayed at the event also connected Israel and Gaza with Epstein, Hollywood and a “Satanic elite.”

CAIR-Chicago Appears in the Convoy’s Current Event Network

CAIR’s connection to the network is not limited to previous collaboration with individual organizers. Promotional material for Freedom Convoy USA’s October 23 “Community Solidarity Meet and Greet” in Chicago displayed the CAIR-Chicago logo. The gathering invited supporters to meet members of Freedom Convoy USA and promoted community programming surrounding the convoy’s stop in the city.

Convoy Media Contact Worked on Hamas-Linked Gaza Flotilla Campaign

The convoy’s press contact, Gur Tsabar, heads Movement Media Hub, which earlier this year helped build the communications operation for the Global Sumud Flotilla. In an April 12 article published under his own name, Tsabar said Movement Media Hub was developing the flotilla’s communications infrastructure, including journalists aboard vessels, multilingual spokespeople, coordinated briefings and rapid responses to media coverage.

That work came nearly three months after the Treasury Department sanctioned the Popular Conference for Palestinians Abroad, or PCPA, under U.S. counterterrorism authorities. Treasury described PCPA as a “main organizer of recent flotillas” that was “clandestinely acting on behalf of Hamas” and operating according to Hamas directives. It said Hamas provided $100,000 toward PCPA’s inaugural conference and placed Hamas-linked figures in leadership positions.

On April 30, the State Department described the Global Sumud Flotilla as a “pro-Hamas initiative” organized by the sanctioned PCPA. Treasury subsequently sanctioned several figures associated with the network, including Saif Hashim Kamel Abukishek, whom it identified as a PCPA General Secretariat member and member of the flotilla’s Steering Committee.

Movement Media Hub’s website currently features Global Sumud Flotilla media appearances involving Abukishek and says the organization has secured more than 450 broadcast segments and articles for the pro-Palestine movement. Its flotilla-related work also predates the 2026 campaign: an August 2025 episode of Blueprints of Disruption listed an interview recorded aboard the Handala, a Freedom Flotilla Coalition vessel, among episodes produced “with the help of” Movement Media Hub.

Freedom Convoy USA’s public materials do not identify the entity or donors financing the cross-country campaign. Its website lists a ProtonMail address for partnerships and Gur Tsabar’s Movement Media Hub contact for press inquiries, but names no nonprofit entity, corporation, fiscal sponsor, treasurer, budget or funding source.

That leaves unclear how transportation, fuel, lodging and other costs for the multi-state operation are being covered.

Organizer Hazami Barmada separately founded the Humanity Lab Foundation. A Greater Washington Community Foundation tax filing shows the 501(c)(3), EIN 27-2223033, received a $350,000 general-support grant. Movement Media Hub also raises money independently, including through a Chuffed campaign that has raised roughly $8,900 toward a $50,000 goal and through donations solicited on its website.

Neither organization publicly identifies those funds as financing Freedom Convoy USA. As the convoy concludes its Washington campaign on October 26, its public materials detail its route, participants and political objectives, but not who is underwriting the operation.

Israeli military communications company Silynxcom is developing a wearable artificial intelligence device designed to warn soldiers about nearby drones by identifying their acoustic signatures, including fiber-optic drones that can evade conventional radio-frequency detection systems.

The Netanya-based company announced the project on October 21 in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The device remains at the prototype stage. According to Silynxcom, onboard AI would analyze surrounding sounds for drone signatures and warn the person wearing it.

Silynxcom is also developing a mesh-networking capability that would allow devices carried by different soldiers to communicate with one another, potentially distributing a detection alert across a platoon. The company says the detector is intended to operate independently of tactical radios while retaining the option of connecting with existing communications equipment.

“Troops need warning that moves with them as they disperse and operate beyond defended positions,” Silynxcom CEO Nir Klein said in the company’s announcement.

A Threat Radio Sensors Can Miss

The technology is aimed in part at a problem that has become increasingly important in modern drone warfare. Fiber-optic drones transmit control commands and video through a physical fiber-optic cable that unspools behind the aircraft as it flies, rather than relying on a conventional radio link.

A U.S. Army Center for Army Lessons Learned analysis published in 2025 said fiber-optic drones pose a significant challenge to counter-drone systems because they can bypass detection technologies that search for command-and-control radio emissions and resist electronic warfare intended to jam or disrupt those signals.

The drones’ onboard electronics may still produce weak electromagnetic emissions, according to the Army, but those signals can be difficult to detect. That has increased interest in alternative methods of locating the aircraft, including listening for the distinctive noise produced by their motors and propellers.

An April 2026 paper published by the Center for Army Lessons Learned examined acoustic drone-detection systems being used in Ukraine. It described networks of passive acoustic sensors that use machine-learning algorithms to classify engine and propeller sounds before sharing detections across a network to help locate and track aircraft.

The paper also outlines the limitations of acoustic detection. Wind, temperature conditions, ambient battlefield noise and quieter propulsion systems can affect performance, and the authors describe acoustic sensors as one layer of a wider detection system rather than a replacement for radar, optical or other sensors.

NATO Sought Solutions for Fiber-Optic Drones

The challenge has also attracted NATO attention. Allied Command Transformation reported that a June 2025 NATO Innovation Challenge focused specifically on detecting, tracking and defeating fiber-optic drones received 162 technical proposals, including 42 from Ukrainian teams.

NATO sought proposed systems using technologies including radar, thermal imaging, optical equipment and acoustic sensors. The alliance said fiber-optic first-person-view drones had demonstrated an ability to circumvent conventional electronic-warfare defenses that rely on interfering with radio-frequency communications.

Silynxcom’s proposed wearable would move that acoustic-detection concept directly onto individual troops, although the company has not publicly disclosed a detection range, false-alarm rate or battlefield test results for the prototype.

Earlier Work Focused on Helping Troops Hear Drones

The new project builds on earlier Silynxcom work involving drone sounds and military hearing protection.

In December 2024, the company said that active noise-reduction systems used by armored-vehicle crews could inadvertently suppress the faint buzzing of an approaching drone along with vehicle and battlefield noise.

Silynxcom developed an upgraded headset intended to preserve or amplify relevant ambient sounds, including drone noise, while continuing to protect users from prolonged or sudden loud sounds. The company said the system could integrate with commonly used vehicle intercom and radio equipment.

In March 2025, Silynxcom reported that the technology had undergone field testing with an unnamed military force in Asia in cooperation with an unidentified global defense contractor. According to the company, the tests involved multiple vehicle platforms and communications systems.

Israeli Combat Experience and Overseas Military Interest

Silynxcom has also linked the development of its newer communications systems to lessons drawn from recent Israeli military operations.

In February 2026, the company announced that its CLARUS II tactical communications and hearing-protection system had undergone a field evaluation by a specialized counterterrorism unit from an unnamed NATO member state.

Silynxcom said CLARUS II incorporated operational lessons from recent Israel Defense Forces combat activity. The company lists technologies associated with the system including ambient-sound monitoring, a low-volume microphone mode and a capability it describes as “Drone Detection.”

The company has also attracted U.S. military business. In October 2024, Silynxcom announced that it had received an order from the U.S. Air Force for tactical communications products in a configuration customized for the service.

If the new system advances beyond the prototype stage, it could give individual soldiers another layer of protection against increasingly difficult-to-detect drones, including threats designed specifically to defeat conventional electronic-warfare systems. Combined with Silynxcom’s existing military customers and field-tested communications equipment, the project represents another example of Israeli battlefield experience being translated into technology with potential applications for allied forces abroad.

The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law has asked the Justice Department to investigate potential Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) violations by UNRWA USA, citing its fundraising and advocacy for the UN Palestinian refugee agency and findings linking agency personnel to Hamas. The Washington nonprofit’s 2024 accounts report $51.4 million in contributions and grants and $44.4 million in contributions to UNRWA. The October 22, 2026, letter alleges that UNRWA USA acts as an unregistered foreign agent through coordinated fundraising, lobbying and publicity.

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Funding an Agency With Hamas-Linked Personnel

The complaint cites a June 5, 2026, report in which USAID’s inspector general referred 101 current or former UNRWA employees for possible suspension or debarment over alleged participation in the October 7, 2023, attacks or affiliation with Hamas’s military wing. Investigators identified a teacher ordered to bring two anti-tank missiles during the attacks and a principal assigned to a Hamas military manufacturing unit whose school had a tunnel shaft underneath. Former principal Hafez Mousa Mohammed Mousa received a ten-year debarment from U.S. contracting and grants after investigators found he coordinated communications during October 7 as a Hamas operative.

An April 2025 Israeli assessment cited in the letter classified 1,462 of 12,521 UNRWA employees in Gaza working in 2023–2024 as members of Hamas or other terrorist organizations, based on intelligence cross-checks. A separate 2024 UN inquiry found possible October 7 involvement by nine of 19 employees, and UNRWA announced their dismissal.

Restoring Funds and Lobbying Congress

UNRWA USA paused fundraising and disbursements in January 2024 after allegations against UNRWA employees. On April 8, it announced their resumption with an immediate $5 million disbursement, citing consultation with counsel, UNRWA risk controls and other governments’ decisions to restore funding.

In April 2026, its advocates from 15 states met more than 50 congressional offices to seek support for legislation restoring U.S. funding. It also led 104 organizations in a December 2025 appeal to Secretary of State Marco Rubio for UNRWA’s inclusion in Gaza’s recovery. Its publicity programs include interviews with UNRWA leaders and an alumni network seeking to build American support.

Its audited accounts disclose a cooperative agreement covering joint charitable and educational activities and a master agreement governing grants to UNRWA. Brandeis cites regular staff contact, joint project oversight and advocacy to argue that the nonprofit must register as a foreign agent. It also argues that lobbying and support for education, summer camps and construction extend beyond FARA’s exemption for certain fundraising limited to medical assistance, food and clothing.

Zohran Mamdani, then New York City’s Democratic mayoral nominee, said he ran the NYC Gaza 5K in Brooklyn’s Prospect Park on October 12, 2025, to raise money for UNRWA USA. He described it as his third time participating and urged followers to donate. UNRWA’s 2025 impact report says the event drew more than 5,000 participants and raised over $2 million.

A Board Appointee’s Role as Spokesperson On Hamas-Linked Flotilla

UNRWA USA announced Rania Batrice’s board appointment in 2025. An Associated Press report, republished May 21, 2026, identified her as a spokesperson for the Global Sumud Flotilla. Two days earlier, Treasury sanctioned Saif Hashim Kamel Abukishek, identifying him as a Popular Conference for Palestinians Abroad (PCPA) official and a flotilla steering committee member. Treasury had designated the PCPA on January 21, describing it as Hamas-controlled and a major organizer of Gaza flotillas.

Controversial Partners and Terrorism-Related Allegations

UNRWA USA’s partners include Human Appeal and Helping Hand for Relief and Development (HHRD). Human Appeal’s UK accounts record £4.7 million in grants during 2020–2023 to Gaza’s Islamic Zakat Society, which Middle East Forum described as Hamas-linked.

A 2019 resolution introduced by Rep. Jim Banks accused HHRD of partnering in 2017 with Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation (FIF), a U.S.-designated alias of Lashkar-e-Taiba.

By April 2026, UNRWA USA’s donor base had grown from 7,000 to more than 200,000 since October 2023, according to CEO Mara Kronenfeld. She said those donors had raised over $100 million for UNRWA-led assistance.

Funding tied to Qatar, Chinese education partnerships, and support from a bank partly owned by Iran have created openings for foreign influence in American K-12 schools, a new report by the Foundation for Defense of Democracies warns.

Published October 21, the report by Brandy Shufutinsky, Jennifer Richmond, and Simone Weichselbaum examines how foreign influence reaches schools through language instruction, teacher training, accreditation, and ownership. Its findings include grant conditions providing classroom access, anti-Israel teaching materials, and partnerships that continued after Confucius Institute closures.

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Qatari Funding and Access to Classrooms

Qatar Foundation International (QFI) was established as the U.S. affiliate of Qatar Foundation, founded by Qatar’s former emir and his wife, Sheikha Moza bint Nasser. QFI’s grants covered teacher salaries, instructional materials, training, and overseas travel.

Working with Open The Books, FDD filed more than 1,400 public-records requests. The report identifies 177 QFI grants and allocations totaling $10.6 million, involving 24 school districts, two charter schools, and three universities supporting K-12 programs. The database includes carried-over funds from earlier awards.

In Houston, QFI awarded more than $1.1 million to the Arabic Immersion Magnet School from 2015 through 2026. Contracts provided for classroom observations by QFI staff or consultants. Emails requested lesson plans before visits and recommended coaching for a teacher, documenting the organization’s involvement in the funded program.

Austin’s Arabic program was awarded more than $462,000 between 2016 and 2022. Materials FDD says it obtained from the program included a Saudi government textbook whose introduction, in FDD’s translation, said many Westerners’ ignorance of Arabs allowed “Zionists to manipulate them.” A separate map omitted Israel and labeled the area “Palestine.”

Qatari officials have denied influencing classroom content. A briefing filed under the Foreign Agents Registration Act in 2024 stated that QFI had “no role in setting or influencing classroom content or management.” QFI’s website now states that its operations have concluded.

Foreign Backing for School Accreditation

The report also examines the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB), a Jeddah-based institution with 57 member countries. The bank identifies Iran as its third-largest shareholder. Iran, Qatar, and Turkey each have representation on its Board of Executive Directors.

IsDB approved $207,000 in 2023 for the Council of Islamic Schools based in North America (CISNA), supporting an organization that applies accreditation standards and conducts school reviews. The bank’s annual report set targets to increase CISNA-accredited schools by 25 percent by the end of 2024 and deliver governance training to 250–300 U.S. participants by the end of 2025.

A 2022 CISNA announcement said it would assign review teams and apply its standards when leading dual accreditation with Cognia, unless a school chose Cognia to lead. The bank’s support therefore reaches an institution responsible for assessing schools and training their leadership.

Bank project records also list $994,960 for construction and expansion at Texas’s Brighter Horizons Academy through projects approved in 1996 and 2011. The school was approved for Texas’s taxpayer-funded school-choice program in March 2026 following litigation.

Chinese Programs Continue Through New Partners

FDD traces continuity between closed Confucius Institutes and the Virginia-based Center for Bridging Cultures (CBC), led by Gao Qing, formerly executive director of the Confucius Institute U.S. Center. The State Department designated the U.S. Center a Chinese foreign mission in 2020.

Beijing Language and Culture University describes CBC as continuing and expanding programs previously offered by Confucius Institutes and Confucius Classrooms. A January 2023 email obtained by FDD shows Gao arranging for CBC to replace Alfred University’s role and provide visa and administrative support for Chinese teachers in K-12 programs.

The report identifies private-school ownership as another potential channel of influence. Spring Education Group is majority-owned by investment funds administered by Hong Kong-based Primavera Holdings. Its network includes more than 200 schools spanning preschool through high school in the United States and abroad. FDD raises concerns about potential access to student and family information through that ownership.

Disclosure Gaps and Proposed Restrictions

The authors identify an oversight gap: K-12 schools lack a nationwide foreign-funding disclosure requirement comparable to the federal rules governing universities. They also warn that foreign governments can maintain influence through U.S.-based nonprofits, and recommend closer scrutiny of those intermediaries and foreign investments in schools. The report ultimately calls for prohibiting foreign funding in elementary and secondary classrooms.

Georgia has enacted a narrower disclosure law, covering public-school funding totaling at least $10,000 per fiscal year from a single defined foreign source of concern, including certain intermediaries. Its first reports are due July 31, 2027.

A new report published Wednesday by the Program on Extremism at George Washington University details a years long effort by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) to influence American K-12 education, including how public schools address terrorism, the October 7 Hamas attacks, antisemitism, Zionism, and Israel.

The October 21 study, titled The Long Game: CAIR’s Campaign to Influence K-12 Education, was authored by Asher Stern, a researcher at the Program on Extremism, and David Collins, a retired FBI special agent with more than 29 years of law enforcement experience, including counterterrorism investigations involving Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood.

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The researchers document how CAIR and its state chapters have developed educator guides, parent advocacy templates, curriculum resources, district outreach programs, legal advocacy initiatives, and legislative campaigns to influence school policies and instructional materials. The report identifies instances in which CAIR’s advocacy reached state education agencies and the processes used to develop official guidance.

CAIR Educator Guide Discouraged Use of “Terrorist” and “Extremist”

Among the report’s findings is a 2024 educator guide published by CAIR New Jersey, which instructs teachers to refrain from using the terms “Extremist” and “Terrorist” in classrooms. The guidance, appearing in a section addressing “Palestine”, also discourages educators from describing Israeli-Palestinian violence as “clashes” or “conflict,” instead presenting Israel’s actions as ethnic cleansing and military occupation.

The researchers also examined a September 2022 curriculum developed by CAIR New Jersey and Teaching While Muslim for classroom discussions of the September 11 terrorist attacks. According to the report, the curriculum attributed the attacks partly to U.S. foreign policy and included a link to the full text of Osama bin Laden’s Letter to America among its educational resources. CAIR New Jersey announced that it had shared resources with nearly 30 school districts encompassing more than 55 public schools, requesting that administrators circulate the material among educators.

Jewish Onliner previously identified in an August 25 investigation that CAIR’s original nationwide 2026–2027 back-to-school guide explicitly directed educators and school boards to the New Jersey 9/11 curriculum containing bin Laden’s manifesto. A subsequent September 1 investigation established that the manifesto appeared under “Background Resources” in sections spanning elementary, middle, and high school levels, rather than only high school as initially identified. The original investigation also uncovered a separate student-activism resource promoted through CAIR’s national guide that advised U.S. citizens to assume front-line protest roles to reduce noncitizens’ exposure to arrest or retaliation.

Following Jewish Onliner’s August 25 investigation, CAIR National removed its endorsement of and hyperlink to the curriculum by August 26. In a subsequent correction, the organization acknowledged that an earlier version had not undergone proper vetting and stated that certain primary-source documents associated with the September 11 perpetrators were better suited for review after K-12 education.

The GWU report also highlights CAIR’s August 2026 expansion of its Unhostile Campus Campaign from colleges and universities into K-12 schools. Its 2026–2027 Back to School Resource Guide includes suggested language for discussing Gaza with children ages five through twelve. The scripts emphasize civilian suffering and human rights without identifying Hamas, Israel, or the October 7 attacks, while other sections encourage educators to explore concepts including apartheid, genocide, and terrorism.

Washington State Revised Education Guidance Following CAIR Campaign

Washington State provides what Stern and Collins describe as the strongest evidence of CAIR gaining access to an official state education process. CAIR Washington challenged guidance issued by the Washington Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI) during the 2024–2025 school year, including language characterizing the slogan “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” as antisemitic.

According to CAIR’s own account, the organization spent months engaging with state education officials and exchanging revisions before OSPI published replacement guidance in June 2025. CAIR described the outcome as an example of achieving structural change through sustained engagement with policymakers. The researchers confirmed that Washington published revised guidance, although the public record does not identify which specific changes were proposed by CAIR.

The report also identifies $380,000 in Washington State appropriations for Islamophobia-related curriculum development, comprising $180,000 approved in 2024 and another $200,000 in 2025. The funding was directed through Puget Sound Educational Service District 121 to support curriculum development by qualified organizations.

CAIR Washington claimed credit for helping secure both allocations, saying it had led the coalition responsible for the funding effort. The researchers also noted that CAIR’s separate claim of $400,000 in funding exceeded the $380,000 identified in the enacted appropriations.

Campaigns Targeted School Curricula and Antisemitism Policies in Other States

The report documents additional CAIR campaigns involving public education in Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania. In Maryland, CAIR mobilized opposition to proposed changes to the state’s social studies framework that would have removed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a specific instructional example. Following a campaign that CAIR said generated more than 3,200 messages to education officials, Maryland restored the reference in August 2025. CAIR claimed the revision as progress, while the state attributed the changes to an internal review.

CAIR subsequently supported House Bill 1202, which would have required Palestinian culture and history to be incorporated into social studies instruction in every Maryland public school beginning in the 2027–2028 school year. The proposal failed to advance out of committee during the 2026 legislative session.

In Virginia, CAIR National urged public schools in January 2026 to reject then-Attorney General Jason Miyares’ recommendation that districts incorporate the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism into school policies. Virginia had already adopted the non-legally binding definition in 2023 as a tool for recognizing and combating antisemitic discrimination. CAIR’s statewide intervention sought to prevent schools from incorporating the definition into student conduct and discrimination policies.

In Pennsylvania, the researchers examined CAIR Philadelphia’s involvement with pro-Palestinian education advocacy groups, including its co-sponsorship of a September 2025 event titled Zionism Is Racism. The event was organized by Philadelphia Parents for Palestine, which has publicly advocated eliminating instructional materials it considers rooted in Zionist teachings. CAIR Philadelphia had also previously provided legal-rights training to Philadelphia Educators for Palestine, another organization involved in the local education advocacy network.

Researchers Cite CAIR’s Historical Connections to Hamas-Linked Networks

The authors also examine CAIR’s institutional history, particularly evidence introduced during the 2008 Holy Land Foundation terrorism-financing trial. Federal records cited in the study place future CAIR co-founders Nihad Awad and Omar Ahmad at a 1993 meeting of the Palestine Committee, a U.S. Muslim Brotherhood structure established to support Hamas. A subsequent 1994 Palestine Committee agenda listed CAIR among its working organizations.

The report notes that the FBI restricted non-investigative contacts with CAIR in 2008, based partly on evidence introduced during the Holy Land Foundation proceedings. It also recalls the Biden administration’s December 2023 decision to remove CAIR from a list of organizations supporting its national antisemitism strategy following remarks by Awad concerning the October 7 attacks.

The researchers conclude that CAIR’s sustained relationships with parents, educators, administrators, lawmakers, and state agencies warrant greater public scrutiny. While its campaigns have produced uneven results across states, the report documents a recurring pattern of engagement with the institutions responsible for educational policy and classroom resources.

Paul Biggar, founder and CEO of Tech for Palestine, is scheduled to speak at the TRT World Forum 2026, organized by Turkey’s state broadcaster on November 6–7 in Istanbul. The event will also feature Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, former Turkish intelligence chief Hakan Fidan, the head of Turkey’s National Intelligence Academy, and a Russian military analyst identified as an FSB agent by Estonia’s foreign intelligence service.

Biggar previously defended membership in Hamas and disputed reports of sexual violence committed during the terrorist organization’s October 7, 2023 attacks on Israel. In an April 16, 2024 article on his personal website, he wrote that “being a member of Hamas is not illegal or even wrong” and asserted there was “little to no evidence of any rapes by Hamas on October 7”.

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According to the forum’s official website, Erdoğan is listed among the inauguration speakers, while Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, who previously directed Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization (MİT) for 13 years, is listed as a keynote speaker. Fidan maintains direct contacts with Hamas leaders, including a meeting earlier this month with the terrorist organization’s political leadership.

The conference’s speaker roster identifies several additional participants with connections to intelligence services, Hamas, organizations accused of supporting terrorism, and Turkish government-linked institutions.

Turkish Intelligence Links and Continuing Hamas Contacts

Fidan, who directed Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization (MİT) from 2010 until becoming foreign minister in 2023, was the subject of an October 2013 Wall Street Journal investigation reporting that U.S. intelligence officials suspected his agency of passing sensitive Western intelligence to Iran. Citing current and former senior U.S. and Middle Eastern officials, the newspaper reported that the CIA began suspecting MİT in 2010 and that American officials believed the agency had passed several intelligence items to Tehran, including classified U.S. assessments about the Iranian government. The reporting also described allegations that sensitive intelligence collected by the United States and Israel had been shared with Iran.

Fidan has also maintained a longstanding working and personal relationship with Hamas’s senior leadership, dating back to his years directing Turkey’s intelligence agency. In a July 2024 interview, he acknowledged working “very closely” with Hamas political leader Khaled Mashal until 2017, before developing a working relationship with his successor, Ismail Haniyeh. Following Haniyeh’s assassination in July 2024, Fidan described their friendship as spanning many years, praised the Hamas leader’s religious devotion, and said he felt privileged to have known and worked with him.

Fidan’s contacts with Hamas have continued as foreign minister. In October 2024, he offered condolences to Hamas officials following the killing of Yahya Sinwar. A year later, he joined Turkey’s serving intelligence chief, İbrahim Kalın, for a meeting with senior Hamas leaders in Doha. Most recently, on October 9, 2026, Turkey’s Foreign Ministry confirmed that Fidan met Hamas political bureau chief Khalil al-Hayya in Ankara.

Another listed speaker is Talha Köse, president of Turkey’s National Intelligence Academy, an institution established within MİT, according to Anadolu. The academy conducts postgraduate education and research in intelligence, security, and strategic affairs.

Russian Speaker Identified as FSB Agent by Estonian Intelligence

Another notable speaker is Ruslan Pukhov, director of the Moscow-based Centre for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies (CAST), a defense research institution with extensive connections to Russia’s military establishment. In its 2024 intelligence report, Estonia’s Foreign Intelligence Service explicitly identified Pukhov as an FSB agent who regularly reports on his foreign contacts to his handler, Alexander Vinnichenko, an officer in the FSB’s Department for Counterintelligence Operations.

According to the report, Pukhov supplies Vinnichenko with information about meetings involving Western diplomats, university researchers, and foreign policy experts. The Estonian service also reported that Pukhov coordinates his participation in international events with his handler, including engagements involving institutions in Turkey, the United States, and Britain.

The same report stated that CAST offered a reward of one million rubles in September 2022 for obtaining an Estonian-made THeMIS unmanned military vehicle deployed in Ukraine and delivering it to Russia’s Defense Ministry.

IHH Researcher Listed on 2025 Programme Featuring Hamas Representative

Another TRT World Forum speaker, Riad Domazeti, is a researcher with the Istanbul-based Humanitarian and Social Research Center (INSAMER), which identifies itself as part of the IHH Humanitarian Relief Foundation. IHH is a Turkish organization with a longstanding history of controversy over its alleged connections to Hamas and other terrorist organizations.

An April 2025 program published by the Kocaeli-based KİVA foundation listed Domazeti as a presenter at a symposium on war and Islamic civilization, where he was scheduled to discuss IHH’s humanitarian diplomacy in Syria. The same day’s program advertised a separate presentation by Dr. Ayman AlMabhouh, identified explicitly as representing the “Hamas Resistance Movement.” His scheduled presentation was titled, “The Palestinian Resistance Movement’s Understanding of Jihad.”

IHH was also identified as a member of the Union of Good, an umbrella network of more than 50 Islamic charities and foundations involved in channeling funds to Hamas institutions in the Palestinian territories. Israel outlawed IHH in 2008 because of its affiliation with the Union of Good and its role in Hamas fundraising, according to the same assessment. The U.S. Treasury designated the Union of Good in November 2008, describing it as an organization created by Hamas leaders to facilitate financial transfers to Hamas-controlled institutions in the West Bank and Gaza.

In a June 2010 briefing, the U.S. State Department also stated that IHH representatives had met senior Hamas officials in Turkey, Syria, and Gaza.

A 2025 study by Israel’s Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center stated that IHH had identified with global jihadist organizations from its early years and had “maintained a close relationship with al-Qaeda.” According to the study, IHH helped facilitate the transfer of jihadist fighters to Bosnia during the 1990s and recruited operatives for al-Qaeda in Bosnia, Chechnya, and Afghanistan.

An earlier 2010 Israeli assessment also characterized IHH as close to the Muslim Brotherhood and accused it of supporting global jihadist networks. In January 2014, Reuters reported that Turkish counterterrorism police raided IHH’s office in Kilis during a broader operation targeting suspected al-Qaeda links.

Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister Reportedly Met Hamas Delegation

The speaker roster also includes Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, Malaysia’s deputy prime minister, who was reportedly involved in a meeting with senior Hamas representatives earlier this year. On April 25, Anadolu reported that Hamas had announced meetings with Malaysian officials, including Zahid.

The delegation included Bassem Naim, a member of Hamas’s political bureau in Gaza, and Fawzi Barhoum, deputy head of its Arab and Islamic relations office. According to Hamas’s statement, the discussions concerned Palestinian affairs, ceasefire negotiations, and strengthening relations with Malaysia.

Erdoğan-Linked Business Network’s U.S. Lobbying Activities

Another scheduled speaker is Burhan Özdemir, president of the Independent Industrialists and Businessmen Association (MÜSİAD), an influential Turkish business organization closely associated with Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).

Özdemir was elected president of MÜSİAD in May 2025 at a general assembly attended by Erdoğan. During the event, Erdoğan recalled that MÜSİAD had accepted him as its first honorary member in 1999, describing the organization’s longstanding support for him.

MÜSİAD operates an American branch, MÜSİAD USA, which has previously participated in political advocacy aligned with Ankara’s positions. A March 2018 report by the Investigative Project on Terrorism (IPT) described MÜSİAD USA as the American branch of an Erdoğan-aligned business network. The report documented its participation alongside other pro-Erdoğan Turkish-American organizations in efforts to lobby Congress against American support for Kurdish forces in Syria, an effort also covered by Turkish media.

Speaker With Qatar Connections and a Meeting With Erdoğan’s Son

Another speaker, British Islamic scholar and publishing executive Sharif H. Banna, has documented connections to Qatar and members of Erdoğan’s family. According to his biography at the Islamic Institute for Development and Research, Banna served as an adviser to Qatar’s government and led an international strategic communications campaign concerning Islam and Muslims during the 2022 FIFA World Cup. He also served on the founding advisory board of a research center at Hamad Bin Khalifa University, part of Qatar Foundation.

On April 27, 2026, Banna participated in a strategic dialogue in Kuala Lumpur alongside Bilal Erdoğan, the Turkish president’s son, according to an event photograph and caption distributed through Reuters Connect.

Banna also chairs the Deventi Group, a British publishing and media business whose Claritas Books division has published Al-Ma’thurat, a collection of Islamic devotional prayers compiled by Hasan al-Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood. The book’s publisher information explicitly identifies its author as the Muslim Brotherhood’s founder.

Forum Programme Focuses on Turkish Influence, Gaza and American Power

The published programme for the November 6–7 conference includes panels titled “Türkiye: From Regional Power to Multi-Regional Actor,” “Gaza at the Intersection of International Law and Humanitarian Collapse,” and “The American Paradox in the International System.” Additional sessions will cover artificial intelligence, digital governance, international trade corridors, energy security, and the global economy.