President Obama’s faith adviser, Eboo Patel, spoke this past weekend at the main event of a three-day convention held by the Muslim Students Association, or MSA, a controversial group founded by the Muslim Brotherhood. Patel appeared on a panel alongside Tariq Ramadan, grandson of the notorious founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, and Siraj Wahhaj, who was named as a possible co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Wahhaj has also defended the convicted WTC bomb plotters and has urged the Islamic takeover of America.
The MSA event was part of a larger weekend convention in which several U.S. Islamic groups held a series of speaking engagements. The convention was arranged by the Islamic Society of North America, itself an unindicted co-conspirator in a scheme to raise money for Hamas. Patel was featured on a panel at what was billed as the “main session” of both the MSA and ISNA conventions. The session was titled “I took the Road Less Traveled by, and that has made all the Difference.”
A description of the panel on the ISNA website states, “We live in a society in which immersion is encouraged and in which we are often confronted with evil. Muslims have always been challenged, but Islam is a guiding star that can help us overcome these challenges as we strive to remain faithful. We must remain confident and unified as we make our short journey through this life. And sometimes, we must be ‘strangers.’”Panel participants with Patel were Ramadan, Wahhaj and Islamic author Yasir Qadhi.
Ramadan’s maternal grandfather was Hasan al-Banna, who in 1928 founded the Muslim Brotherhood. Osama bin Laden routinely referred to al-Banna in al-Qaida doctrine. Ramadan’s father, Said Ramadan, led the Brotherhood throughout the 1950s and then was exiled from Egypt to Switzerland.Wahhaj is an African American convert to Islam via the Nation of Islam.He repeatedly has urged the U.S. to accept Islamic law.
Discover the Networks notes Wahhaj in 1991 predicted America will fall unless it “accepts the Islamic agenda.”The next year, he stated, “Hear what I’m telling you well. The Americans are not your friends … The Canadians are not your friends. … The Europeans are not your friends. Your friend is Allah, the Messenger and those who believe.”
Also, in a 1992 address to an audience of Muslims in New Jersey, Wahhaj expressed his desire to replace the U.S. government with an Islamic caliphat“If we were united and strong,” Wahhaj said, “we’d elect our own emir (leader) and give allegiance to him. … [T]ake my word, if 6-8 million Muslims unite in America, the country will come to us.”