A number of other CAIR officials have been charged with, and some convicted of, offenses related to the support of
Islamist terrorism.
On
February 2,
1995, CAIR advisory board member
Imam Siraj Wahaj was named by the Office of the U.S. Attorney as one of several "unindicted persons who may be alleged as co-conspirators in the attempt to blow up New York City monuments," including the World Trade Center in
1993. He has called for replacing the American government with an Islamic
caliphate, warned that America will crumble unless it submits to Islam, and was a character witness during Abdel-Rahman's World Trade Center bombing trial.
On
December 18,
2002, Ghassan Elashi, a founding board member of CAIR-Texas and a co-founder of the Holy Land Foundation, was arrested by the
FBI on charges of having ties with front groups that fund Islamic terrorism. In 2005, Elashi and two of his brothers were convicted on 21 counts of federal
terrorism charges related to funding
Hamas and the illegal export of electronics equipment to U.S. State Department-designated state sponsors of terrorism.
In January
2003, CAIR's director of community relations and founder of the
Islamic Assembly of North America, Bassem Khafagi, was arrested by the
FBI on charges of having ties to front groups that fund
Islamist terrorism. Khafagi pleaded guilty to charges of visa and bank fraud, and agreed to be deported to
Egypt.
In August 2003, CAIR's former civil-rights coordinator, Randall "Ismail" Royer, was arrested on charges of possessing "in his automobile an
AK-47-style rifle and 219 rounds of ammunition" in September 2001, and conspiring to provide material support to
al Qaeda and to the
Taliban. He pleaded guilty and is serving 20 years in federal prison.
