|
 In
a federal indictment issued recently out of the Eastern District
of Virginia, a grand jury charged Soliman Biheiri with three
counts of immigration violations. Although these are seemingly
innocuous charges, Biheiri is a central figure in a complex
terrorism investigation spanning several years and several
terrorist attacks.
According
to the affidavit supporting his arrest, a company founded by
Biheiri, BMI, was a financial conduit for several known Hamas
and al Qaeda moneymen. Upon arrest, Biheiri had contact
information for two individuals described by the Treasury
Department as "financial advisers to al-Qaeda." In addition,
Biheiri's estranged wife told federal investigators that she
witnessed her husband destroying documents after the 9/11
attacks.
Investigators are now exploring links between Biheiri, the
Saudi-sponsored International Islamic Relief Organization, and
Mercy International, a charity implicated in the 1998 East
Africa embassy bombings.
WHO IS SOLIMAN
BIHEIRI
Fifty-one-years old and Egyptian by birth, Biheiri received a
Master's degree in economics from the
University
of Freibourg in Switzerland before leaving for the United States
in January 1985. Two months after he arrived in the U.S., he
founded BMI, a New Jersey-based investment bank specializing in
Islamically permissible investments.
In the
1980s and 90s, Biheiri and BMI offered a series of financial
services to Muslims in America. With advertisements in popular
Islamic magazines such as The Message, The Minaret,
and Al Jummah, BMI solicited funds for real-estate
investments and offered leasing services for wealthy Muslim
business owners. By 1992, BMI boasted over $1 million in medical
equipment and automobile leases under management, and advertised
housing developments in Maryland and Indiana with projected
revenues in excess of $25 million.
SOLIMAN BIHEIRI
& SULIMAN AL-ALI
In 1985, Biheiri met a man named Suliman al-Ali in New Jersey.
The two became personal friends, attending Islamic conferences
together and entertaining at each other's homes. In 1989, al-Ali
left the United States for Saudi Arabia to become a full time
fundraiser for the International Islamic Relief Organization (IIRO).
As described in the Biheiri affidavit, IIRO has extensive
contacts with Islamist terrorist organization, including al
Qaeda and Hamas.
According
to tax filings, Al-Ali raised over $500,000 in his first year
with IIRO. Impressed with his fundraising abilities, the Saudis
sent al-Ali back to the U.S. to open IIRO's official office in
the Washington,
D.C. area.
Al-Ali
landed in Washington,
D.C. in 1991 with his
checkbook and a mission. By this time, the Saudi-relief
infrastructure that supported the jihad in Afghanistan had
shifted focus to Eastern Europe. Muslims in Bosnia were being
massacred by the Serbs and al-Ali had $10 million to put towards
Bosnian aid. Over the next several years, al-Ali channeled at
least $4 million of this money to BMI investments run by Biheiri.
THE TROUBLE
BEGINS
On August 18, 1998, eleven days after al Qaeda decimated the
U.S. embassies in East Africa,
Biheiri received a disturbing phone call. Hassan Bahfzallah, the
secretary of the Investment Committee for IIRO in
Saudi Arabia, contacted Biheiri
to inquire about IIRO investments with BMI and the activities of
Suliman al-Ali. A couple of days later, Biheiri became "very
alarmed" when he received a personal letter from Abdullah al-Obaid,
the secretary general of the Muslim World League and a man
Biheiri described as the "Pope of the Muslim[s]."
Biheiri was
instructed to "cancel the validity of Dr. Suliman Al-Ali's
signature in regards to all [IIRO] accounts with your firm."
Biheiri, BMI and al-Ali were later sued by IIRO's affiliate Sana-Bell,
who claimed that their funds had been misappropriated by the
pair. At the trial, Biheiri acknowledged that al-Ali withdrew
over $1 million from BMI accounts that had disappeared.
Soon
afterwards, an FBI agent investigating Hamas money laundering
identified Biheiri's BMI as an entity involved in funneling
money to Hamas operatives in the United States. As a result,
Biheiri was subpoenaed by the FBI.
The FBI
discovered that the true principals behind BMI were actually
Musa abu Marzook and Yasin Qadi. Marzook was a powerful Hamas
leader who resided in the United States until he was arrested
and finally deported in 1997. Qadi has been described as a
terrorist financier by the U.S. Treasury Department. As head of
the Muwafaq relief organization, he is alleged to have funneled
millions of dollars to al Qaeda in Eastern Europe, Africa and
South East Asia. By executive order, both Marzook and Qadi are
now designated terrorists.
In the
course of the investigation, a BMI officer approached the FBI
with a shocking confession. The officer told federal agents that
he believed funds he transferred overseas on behalf of BMI might
have been used to finance the 1998 East Africa embassy bombings.
HAVE MERCY
Several financial transfers involving Biheiri's friend and
business partner al-Ali have increased concerns about the BMI
confession regarding the embassy bombings.
In the two
years before the embassy attacks, al-Ali disclosed that he sent
almost $200,000 to Mercy International in Canada, a branch of
the Michigan-based Mercy International. The legal name of the
Canadian office is actually Mercy International Relief Agency.
Additionally, al-Ali and IIRO funneled millions of dollars to a
Chicago-based chemical company run by a director of Mercy
International. The company was raided by the FBI in 1997 amidst
allegations of terrorism support and suspicious chemical
compounds. The Mercy director is currently serving a 51-month
sentence for fraud. IIRO's offices in Virginia were also raided
as part of the investigation.
At the 2001
embassy-bombing trial, federal prosecutors identified several
companies and charities that served as fronts to aid the
attackers, including Mercy International Relief Agency.
Prosecutors cited telephone records showing that Osama bin
Laden's satellite phone was in contact with the mobile phone of
Mercy director Ahmad Sheik Adam; and Bin Laden lieutenant and
key orchestrator Wadih el Hage testified that he kept his files
at the Mercy International office in Kenya. In his Rolodex were
found the business cards of two Mercy officers in
Kenya
and one in the United
States. Also, Mercy International receipts dated July 24, 1998,
make mention of "getting the weapons from Somalia."
In the
United States, Mercy International originally went by the name
Human Concern International (HCI), an organization created in
the 1980s to support the Afghan jihad against the Soviets. Their
Pakistan offices were headed by Ahmed Khadr, a close associate
of bin Laden and an al Qaeda moneyman. In 1989, HCI changed its
name to Mercy International-USA and moved to Michigan.
In response
to news reports implicating "Mercy International" in the embassy
attacks, Umar al-Qadi, president of Mercy in Michigan and
founder of Mercy International Relief Agency in Canada, has
publicly insisted that his organization had no relation to the
organization in Kenya or the bombings themselves. Qadi explained
that his group was named "Mercy International-USA" while the
group in Kenya was "Mercy International Relief Agency." However,
in July of 1995, Umar al-Qadi himself registered a "Mercy for
International Relief Agency" in Ontario,
Canada, which he
described as a sister organization.
Many
questions remain unanswered about the activities of BMI, IIRO,
and Mercy International. Biheiri's friend al-Ali fled the United
States following the FBI raid of his Virginia offices. According
to an official at the Saudi embassy, he was arrested in Saudi
Arabia in October of 2000, but has remained free on bail for the
last three years. His current whereabouts are unknown.
Biheiri's
detention hearing is scheduled for today (Thursday) in the
Eastern District of Virginia. As a central figure in a complex
financial network, Soliman Biheiri could potentially shed more
light on the hazy underworld of terrorism financing.
— Matthew
Epstein is an attorney and senior terrorism analyst at the
Investigative Project, a Washington, D.C.-based counterterrorism
think tank established in 1995. Ben Schmidt is a terrorism
analyst for the Investigative Project.
Also must
reads:
CANTOR FITZGERALD VS. THE
KINGDOM
Muslim Male Extremists |
