Yesterday Jihad Watch brought you a report about these two Muslim brothers from Texas who joined the Islamic State, and their parents who lied to the FBI about it. This story has much more detail, including this: “A Texas college friend who asked that his name be withheld because he didn’t want to be associated with Arman said he arrived at UT-Austin as a ‘pretty normal kid.’ But he became religious during his second year and gradually grew more orthodox. Arman was no longer playing soccer, basketball and video games with friends. He was spending more time at the mosque, he said.”
So once again we see a Muslim becoming more observant in Islam and then joining a jihad terror group. There are so very many examples of this; just today a Muslim in Canada who stabbed a woman in the throat explained that he did it because he started listening to the Qur’an. Yet authorities persist in claiming that Islam has nothing to do with terrorism. We even see the claim that jihadis know little about Islam and care even less. Arman Ali’s trajectory tells a different story.
Also, which mosque in the Austin, Texas area was Arman Ali attending? Has it been investigated? Has the FBI tried to determine whether Arman Ali got the idea to join the Islamic State from what he was taught there? Almost certainly not: the FBI remains determinedly clueless regarding the jihad terror threat. If we had any investigators who were patriotic and worth their salt, that mosque would be thoroughly investigated, and agents would be closely monitoring its teachings and attendees.
Note also that Omar Ali was working in strict accord with the Qur’an: “He emailed her again in October 2014 to say, ‘Allah tells the Muslim to fight, kill and exile “those who wage war against Allah or His messenger,”‘ according to court records.”
“Indeed, the penalty for those who wage war against Allah and His Messenger and strive upon earth corruption is none but that they be killed or crucified or that their hands and feet be cut off from opposite sides or that they be exiled from the land. That is for them a disgrace in this world; and for them in the Hereafter is a great punishment” (Qur’an 5:33).
“FBI says men from Plano went to fight with ISIS and their parents lied about it,” by Kevin Krause, Dallas News, October 11, 2017 (thanks to Kamala):
They were raised in a two-story brick house on a quiet Plano residential street, across from a church and a park. They went to good schools and enjoyed video games and music like their friends.
But Arman, 27, and Omar Ali, 26, would not follow the path of most Plano kids leaving home to start a life.
After some college study, the brothers moved to Egypt and then traveled to Syria to fight alongside ISIS terrorists, according to federal court records.
Now, their parents are charged with lying to the FBI about their sons’ activities in the Middle East. Mohommad Hasnain Ali and Sumaiya Ali pleaded guilty in federal court in June to making a false statement regarding international terrorism. They were scheduled to be sentenced on Thursday, but the hearing has been postponed. A new date has not been established.
It’s unclear whether the brothers are still alive. They were charged in a sealed federal complaint in March with providing material support or resources to designated foreign terrorist organizations. No indictments have been publicly filed in the case.
The case illustrates what studies of leaked ISIS files have shown: Many Islamic State recruits from the U.S. are well-educated and come from middle-class families. Plano neighbors described the Ali family as quiet but friendly. The father played tennis with one neighbor and engaged in friendly discussions with him about religion. The whole family came over for dinner one night.
Mohommad Ali, 57, declined to comment when reached at his Plano home on Monday.
But when FBI agents interviewed him in May 2015, he told them his sons were in Cairo, Egypt.
“He advised that his sons were peaceful, liked to study, and never indicated they would be affiliated with any terrorist group,” plea documents in the case said.
But his emails tell a different story.
In October 2014, Arman emailed his father a link to a video of an ISIS military parade in Libya. In the email, Arman talked about others who had traveled from the U.S. to join ISIS, according to federal court records.
In November, Arman sent his mother an email with his travel itinerary. She shared it with her husband. Arman and Omar traveled from Egypt to Syria via Turkey to fight for ISIS in late 2014, court records show.
Arman sent his father an email from Syria in March 2015:
“Things are heating up here, and I can’t guarantee me or Omar will be there in 2 months… I’ve been to the hospital every day with brothers from my group. Close friends have died, too many injured. Me and Omar are perfectly fine right now, but soon we may not be.”
But Mohommad Ali continued to tell the FBI agents that “there was no way his sons were in Syria,” court records show.
Sumaiya Ali, 49, also denied her sons were fighting, telling agents they are “very reserved” and had not made friends in Egypt.
“The defendant insisted that her sons would never be involved with ISIS or any other group,” plea documents said.
It was a lie, according to federal authorities.
“Prior to her sons’ departure from Egypt, the defendant communicated regularly with them regarding their whereabouts and desire to fight for ISIS,” plea documents said.
In February 2014, for example, she told Omar, “Do what you need to do.”
Omar responded: “Ok then going to Syria it is.”
He emailed her again in October 2014 to say, “Allah tells the Muslim to fight, kill and exile ‘those who wage war against Allah or His messenger,’” according to court records.
In March 2015, Omar told his mother he was trying to transfer to an “English speaking battalion.”…
The house they grew up in near Coit Road and Hedgcoxe Road is valued at $423,959.
So much for the “poverty causes terrorism” claim.
Arman attended the University of Texas at Austin from fall 2008 to spring 2011 but did not earn a degree, a university spokesperson said. His LinkedIn page said he studied neurobiology and religion at the school.
It said he earned a bachelor’s degree in Arab and Islamic civilization from The American University in Cairo in 2014. Arman’s LinkedIn page also said he earned a master’s degree in Islamic studies from the school. The university declined to confirm that, saying its policy is not to release student information without their consent.
A Texas college friend who asked that his name be withheld because he didn’t want to be associated with Arman said he arrived at UT-Austin as a “pretty normal kid.”
But he became religious during his second year and gradually grew more orthodox.
Arman was no longer playing soccer, basketball and video games with friends. He was spending more time at the mosque, he said. He grew a beard and started listening to Alex Jones, a conspiracy theorist who runs Infowars….
Jack Diamond says
Nothing to do with a master’s degree in Islamic studies or with the mosque or the Qur’an. It’s not listening to Muhammad that is dangerous, the Dallas News says he “started listening to Alex Jones…”
“It’s not something you expect to find in your neighborhood,” said a Plano neighbor.
Golly, like seeing a flying saucer or somethin’. Real life Muslim eggstreamists here in our nice sleepy, bucolic, freshly lawn-mowed corner of suburbia. Who says nothing ever happens around here?
Westman says
More taqiyya. Muslims don’t become radicalized by Info Wars or its host Alex Jones, a show that is definitely anti-Islam. That is one whopper of a misdirection by the classmate who must have been holding back laughter at the thought of the Dallas News swallowing such nonsense. Punking is all the rage on campus these days.
TruthandJustice says
Perhaps InfoWars made him mad? Alex Jones is most certainly NOT an Islam sympathizer.
gravenimage says
Texas: Muslim who joined ISIS first became religious and started spending more time at the mosque
……………….
Gee, who ever would have thought? sarc/off
And note, the Muslim parents not only lied to US law enforcement about their sons having gone to Syria to wage Jihad, but they also gave them their blessing. *Ugh*.
gary says
“One Nation under God. With liberty and justice for all.”
Oh wait?! No! Some folks insist on being enslaved….
Islam: Satan’s playground.
eduardo odraude says
Interesting video by David Wood on Nabeel Qureshi, Aisha, and Muhammad
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26GsSRsz8Q8
gravenimage says
David Wood *rocks*!
TL says
Robert, I want to challenge your claim that “once again we see a Muslim becoming more observant in Islam and then joining a jihad terror group.” You yourself affirmed that Arman arrived in Austin as “a ‘pretty normal kid'”. In contemporary American culture, this means that Arman was a secularist devoted to common secular activities such as “soccer, basketball and video games with friends”. And to music, too.
The fact that he was nominally Islamic upon his arrival was important then as a predictor of the direction in which he would travel if he became religious, as we now know that he did, but there is a universe of difference between affirming a religion with one’s mouth and living that religion from head to toe with one’s mind and body in harmony. When Arman arrived in Austin he was, at most, affirming Islam with his mouth. Hence, he counted then as no Muslim at all.
So it would be better to write a summary like this:
Once again we see a secularist becoming a Muslim and then joining a jihad terror group in order to practice his religion.
Jack Diamond says
I don’t think he qualifies as a secularist.
Just because he was a bad Muslim doesn’t mean he wasn’t a Muslim. And affirming Islam with your mouth is all that is required to be a Muslim. Clearly, his cultural sympathies were with Islam, not basketball. This led him down the path to finally becoming a good Muslim and wanting to kill the unbelievers.
TL says
Arman’s BEHAVIOR shows that his “cultural sympathies” were with secular activities. Further, you need to dig a little deeper into Islam. The literary character called Muhammad was well familiar with the human habit of lying. So, no, it’s not enough to affirm Islam with one’s mouth. Any kafir can do that to evade punishment at the hands of needy outlaws who are attracted to that cult of personality.
Jack Diamond says
Did Arman pray? Did he pray sometimes but not all the time? Did he not pray out of ignorance and heedlessness but out of rebellion and rejection of Islam? Did he pray and just imitate some of the ways of the unbelievers? Might want to know these things before deciding he was a secularist or a kaffir. In any case, the choices he did make indicate where his deeper sympathies lay.
“It’s not enough to affirm Islam with one’s mouth.” That is quite mistaken. I never said Islam was not full of contradictions and idiocies.
Ibn Hisham in “The Biography of Muhammad”(Part 4, Page 11)
{When Abu Sufyan, leader of the Quraysh of Mecca, is brought to Muhammad he is ordered to confess “there is no God but the only God” and “I (Muhammad) am his Apostle.”}
“Muhammad told him: “Woe to you, O Abu Sufyan. Is it not time for you to realize that there is no God but the only God?” Abu Sufyan answered: “I do believe that.” Muhammad then said to him: “Woe to you, O Abu Sufyan. Is it not time for you to know that I am the apostle of God?” Abu Sufyan answered: “By God, O Muhammad, of this there is doubt in my soul.” The ‘Abbas who was present with Muhammad told Abu Sufyan: “Woe to you! Accept Islam and testify that Muhammad is the apostle of God before your neck is cut off by the sword.” Thus he professed the faith of Islam and became a Muslim.”
{he professed Islam with the choice of convert or die, only with his mouth. Muhammad then considered him a Muslim)
Dr. Mohammad Said Ramadan al-Buti in “The Jurisprudence of Muhammad’s Biography” repeats this story, he thinks some might object to faith being imposed by the threat of beheading! His commentary:
“What is required of an infidel or one who confuses other gods with God, is to have his tongue surrender to the religion of God and subdue himself to the prophethood of Muhammad. But his heartfelt faith is not required at the beginning. It will come later.”
It was enough to affirm Islam with just your mouth to become a Muslim.
Ibn Hisham “Biography of the Apostle” p 134:
“Muhammad sent Khalid ibn al-Walid to the tribe of the children of Haritha and told him “Call them to accept Islam before you fight with them… if they refuse, fight them” THEY ENTERED ISLAM BY FORCE. He brought them to Muhammad: Had you not accepted Islam I would have cast your heads under your feet.”
Do you think their profession didn’t count because it was by force and just from their mouth?
Forced conversions are not “compulsion in religion” to Muslims because they are not being forced to believe in their hearts, just confess with their tongue. But then that verse is abrogated anyway by the obligation to make them convert or die (the ultimate “force”) Convert or die or live in subjugation and humiliation until they do convert or die. 9:5; 9:29.
Ibn Kathir “The Prophetic Biography” (part 3, p. 596).
Muhammad’s followers met a man and asked him to become a Muslim. The man asked them, “What is Islam?” to which Muhammad’s followers explained Islam to him. He then asked, “What if I refuse to convert to Islam? What would you do to me?” They answered, “We would kill you.” Despite that, he refused to become a Muslim and they killed the poor man after he went and bade his wife farewell. She continued to weep over his corpse for days until she died of grief over her slain beloved who was killed for no reason other than that he refused to accept Islam.
When Steve Centanni, the news reporter, was captured by jihadis in Gaza, he was released on the condition he make a video professing his conversion to Islam. Centanni said he recited the shahada at gunpoint. Would Muhammad have accepted such a thing or thought it didn’t count? If Centanni openly renounces or denounces Islam will a great many Muslims regard him as an apostate?
Islam doesn’t have to make sense. Allah, who ordered all this murder and convert or kill everyone, who ordered anyone leaving Islam should be killed, also says it is not his will for everyone to believe, that he could if he wanted guide everyone to faith but has chosen to mislead a majority–because he needs to fill up Hell with them!
gravenimage says
Oh, good grief.
The idea that having “cultural sympathies” with secularism and liking soccer, basketball, video games, and music are predictors of Jihad terrorism but *being a Muslim is not* is just ludicrous. (Never mind that fact that many devout Jews and Christians like these things as well).
In fact, if these are predictors for Jihad terror, I’d better keep an eye on my husband–and most of my Infidel neighbors–oh, and myself, as well…sarc/off
gravenimage says
Good posts, Jack.
Infidel says
This is how that story has been going on for the past 1400 years and will continue… What a shame!!
dumbledoresarmy says
The mosque, the mosque, the mosque.
Never mind about the internets. That’s secondary. And very often a diversion, to deflect attention away from the Muslim home (if the jihadist is a ‘cradle Muslim’) and the mosque (whether the jihadist is a cradle Muslim, or a convert).
It begins and ends at the mosque. The mosque is the focus. The mosque is the ‘safe house’, the physical locus of jihad, the fort, the arsenal, the magazine, the bomb-and-weapons factory.
Every police chief and intelligence chief in the entire Infidel world needs to read Sam Solomon’s two books – ‘Al Hijra: The Islamic Doctrine of Immigration’ and “The Mosque and its Role in Society”. If they want additional corroboration they should read ex-Muslim Patrick Sookhdeo’s massively detailed and referenced “Faith, Power and Territory” – which *also* talks about Islamisation as, at bottom, a ‘land-grab’ process; and his booklet “Islam in Britain’ which functions as a real-life real-time case study of that land-grab influence-grab process *in action*.
Every time a jihad attack takes place, or is attempted, or is detected and fortunately foiled, the *first* place the local cops should raid and search, is the mosque. Or the mosques. Every mosque within a radius of twenty miles, just for starters. Raid and search. find anything dodgy? – whether related to the particular investigation, or not – then.. shut the damn thing down, raze it to the ground once the forensics are gathered and documented, and deport the imam; resume the property.
gravenimage says
Absolutely agree, DDA.
Jacqueleen says
This story confirms my humble opinion that there is no such thing as a peaceful Muslim. Every Muslim lives according to the dictates of the Koran….We are at war with Islam.
Allah is Satan and Muslims are Satan’s followers. ISOLATION IS THE ONLY WAY TO DEAL WITH MUSLIMS. It is far more merciful than battling them with weapons. Evict them all and send them to Saudi Arabia for financing them and to Yemen for training them. Ban them from migrating to any civilized nation.
The moderates practice DAWA which is another way of gaining control of a country without firing a shot. It is multiplying until in the majority and infiltrating all facets of society so that when in the majority they will take over the country. WE ARE AT WAR WITH ISLAM LIKE IT OR NOT…..PICK UP YOUR WEAPON (THE ROSARY) AND CALL FOR “EVICT AND BAN EVERY MUSLIM.”
In this case, the parents liked because the Koran tells them to lie to the infidels and to deceive them to achieve their goals. WANT MORE PROOF THAT MUSLIMS CANNOT BE TRUSTED? ARE YOU AWAKE OR A GLUTTON FOR PUNISHMENT?
Jacqueleen says
Correction: The parents LIED because the Koran tells them to lie to the infidels…etc.
gravenimage says
Texas: Muslim who joined ISIS first became religious and started spending more time at the mosque
………………………..
How often do we hear *this*?
And yes–what are the chances that this Mosque will be investigated? No–that would be “Islamophobic”…