The Brotherhood in Your Backyard: Islamic Circle of North America
Renewed congressional scrutiny of the Muslim Brotherhood brings attention to the 29 organizations from the 1991 Memorandum, and their documented advancement of Brotherhood objectives in America
Editor's note: This is the inaugural article in a series examining alleged Muslim Brotherhood front groups in the United States—the 29 organizations listed in the infamous 1991 Muslim Brotherhood Explanatory Memorandum outlining a "Civilization-Jihadist Process" to destroy Western civilization from within. With renewed U.S. government focus on Brotherhood networks and recent congressional scrutiny, this series investigates the documented connections between these groups and their historical advancement of Brotherhood strategic objectives in America.
The Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) operates as a sprawling 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization that claims 12 subsidiary entities under its umbrella and maintains 24 regional chapters across the United States and Canada. The organization hosts what it bills as the largest annual Muslim convention in North America, drawing tens of thousands of attendees.
Critics have noted that ICNA operates as an apparent “proselytizing arm” of the web of alleged Muslim Brotherhood front groups—providing the infrastructure, personnel, and platforms to convert Americans to Islam while simultaneously serving as recruitment grounds where extremist speakers radicalize attendees and mobilize support for Hamas and global Islamist causes.
Unlike many Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated organizations in America that trace their roots to Egyptian or Arab activists, ICNA was founded in 1968 by South Asian immigrants with deep ties to Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), the Pakistani sister organization to the Muslim Brotherhood. Founded by Abul A’la Mawdudi—who spoke at ICNA’s first public meeting in 1974—Jamaat-e-Islami shares the Brotherhood’s ultimate objective: establishing Islamic governance globally operating under Sharia law. Multiple investigations have identified ICNA as the primary U.S. affiliate of this South Asian Islamist movement.
Behind the facade of community outreach and charitable work lies a darker reality: ICNA was explicitly listed as organization #26 under “Our organizations and the organizations of our friends,” in the infamous 1991 Muslim Brotherhood “Explanatory Memorandum”—a strategic document that described the Brotherhood’s work in America as “a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within.”
The Dawah Machine: Proselytizing as Strategy
What distinguishes ICNA within the Brotherhood network is its specialized role as what appears to be the movement's dawah, (Islamic proselytizing) arm. FBI wiretaps from a 1993 Philadelphia meeting captured alleged Muslim Brotherhood leaders explicitly discussing this function.
According to a July 2025 George Washington University report, the wiretaps reveal attendees arguing that "the Committee should have used the annual conferences and the network of Islamic schools run by affiliated organizations such as MAS, ISNA, and ICNA to disseminate books and introduce speakers who could raise awareness over the need to support Hamas.
Thirty years later, ICNA has transformed that vision into reality. Operating through 8 regional offices and 24 chapters nationwide, the organization has built a sophisticated conversion infrastructure with industrial-scale efficiency. Its 2023 annual report documents the distribution of over 100,000 Qurans, more than 500 conversions to Islam, and over 400 dawah booths deployed across the country.
Three dedicated proselytizing divisions—National Dawah, “Why Islam”, and GainPeace—function with corporate precision. WhyIslam.org reports receiving "a new request every 6 minutes" for the text of the Quran and operates on a standardized "$8 per dawah package" model.
Beyond these core operations, ICNA claims 12 sub-entities targeting every demographic from children to new converts, most operating as standalone nonprofits with their own regional chapters—creating a sprawling empire of interlocking organizations that share leadership, resources, and the ultimate goal articulated in that 1993 wiretapped meeting.
Infiltrating America’s Schools
Perhaps most troubling is ICNA’s systematic educational outreach targeting children in taxpayer-funded public schools. The organization’s 2023 annual report boasts of conducting “Ramadan awareness programs in various public schools and libraries” and maintaining dawah booths at the “Brooklyn Fair, NJ Teachers Convention, Miami Book Fair, TN Early Childhood National Convention.”
This strategy materialized dramatically in February 2026 when ICNA’s “Why Islam” division set up an unauthorized booth at Wylie East High School in Texas during school hours. Four “Why Islam” representatives distributed Qurans, Sharia law pamphlets, and hijabs to students—without parental notification or district approval. Wylie ISD acknowledged a “procedural breakdown” and placed a staff member on leave, but the incident exposed ICNA’s aggressive school infiltration tactics nationwide.
The Helping Hand Problem
The depth of ICNA’s concerning connections becomes clearer through its affiliated charity, Helping Hand for Relief & Development (HHRD). The organization is currently led by Javaid Siddiqi, who served as ICNA president from 2017 to 2020 before taking the helm at HHRD. Multiple members of Congress have requested a State Department investigation into collaboration between HHRD and Lashkar-e-Taiba, a U.S.-designated terrorist organization.
A June 2025 academic study concluded that “ICNA and its affiliates—particularly Helping Hands for Relief and Development—are linked to radical elements, terror-designated organizations, and jihad advocacy in regions like Kashmir and Palestine.”
Most alarmingly, Siddiqi continues to speak at ICNA-MAS conventions, where he was documented using explicit jihad rhetoric in the latest ICNA-MAS conference in December 2025.
The same convention featured Siraj Wahhaj, whom federal prosecutors named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, and Mohammad Qatanani, who concealed his conviction for Hamas membership from U.S. immigration authorities. The event included sponsorships from the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) and Turkish Airlines.
Federal Funding Fuels the Operation
The fungibility of resources between ICNA’s entities raises serious questions about taxpayer complicity. ICNA Relief USA, the domestic humanitarian arm, received $10.3 million in FEMA grants between 2016 and 2018. Yet ICNA Relief shares leadership with HHRD—former ICNA president Mohsin Ansari served as chairman of both organizations.
When federal disaster relief dollars flow to ICNA Relief, they may free up other funds for the organization's extensive dawah operations and convention programming that reportedly platforms extremists. Such resource allocation patterns, if occurring as described, would warrant closer examination of how federal grants interact with organizational finances.
President Trump’s November 2025 executive order initiating the process to designate certain Muslim Brotherhood chapters as foreign terrorist organizations has renewed focus on the network’s American tentacles. ICNA, named in the Brotherhood’s strategic planning documents, warrants scrutiny.
While the organization appears to conduct legitimate charitable and interfaith work, internal Brotherhood documents describe a parallel strategy of “civilization jihad”—advancing Islamist objectives over time. This tension between public community service and alleged underlying ideology requires careful examination.