The Brotherhood in Your Backyard: The Full Network
Concluding Jewish Onliner's investigative series into the network of alleged Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated organizations in the United States.
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In 1991, a senior Muslim Brotherhood operative named Mohamed Akram penned what would become one of the most significant strategic documents ever seized in a U.S. terrorism investigation. The “Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Group in North America” laid out a blueprint for Islamic dominance that federal prosecutors would later introduce as evidence in the largest terror-financing trial in American history.
The memo didn’t mince words about its ultimate objective. The role of the Muslim Brotherhood in America, Akram wrote, is “a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and ‘sabotaging’ its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.”
The mechanism for this “Civilization-Jihadist Process” was an intricate web of ostensibly benign organizations operating across various sectors of American civic life — from healthcare to education, finance to student activism. The memorandum identified 29 groups as part of what it called “our organizations and the organizations of our friends.” Many of these groups remain active today.
Amidst increased federal scrutiny, Jewish Onliner has investigated the organizations named in this network, tracing their operations, leadership, and influence across American civic life.
Below are the links to all of the articles in the series.
Mapping the Muslim Brotherhood
ISNA - Islamic Society of North America
CISNA - Council of Islamic Schools in North America
MSA - Muslim Students’ Association
NAAIMS - North American Association of Islamic and Muslim Studies (formerly AMSS)
IMANA - The Islamic Medical Association of North America (formerly IMA)
NAIT - North American Islamic Trust
ICW - Islamic Centers Waqf
ICCF - Islamic Centers Cooperative Fund
IF - Iman Fund
ICD - Islamic Centers Division
ATP - American Trust Publications
IBS - Islamic Book Service
MBA - Muslim Businessmen Association
MYNA - Muslim Youth of North America
FCNA - Fiqh Council of North America (formerly IFC)
MISG - Malasian Islamic Study Group
ICNA - Islamic Circle of North America
ICNAR - ICNA Relief
YM - Young Muslims
WI - WhyIslam
TRB - Tarbiyah
HHRD - Helping Hand for Relief and Development
BMI - Baitul Mal Inc.
IIIT - International Institute for Islamic Thought
IIC - Islamic Information Center
11 Defunct Groups from Original List
The Enduring Blueprint
The Muslim Brotherhood understood what many in the U.S. government still struggle to grasp: that influence is built through PTAs and professional associations, through charities and campus clubs, through the unglamorous work of bureaucratic colonization. The memorandum’s list wasn’t a directory. It was a battle plan — and the war is still being waged in plain sight.