MAYA-IAP Conference
Oklahoma City, OK
Hamas
Dr. Kamal Helbawy is the former representative of the Muslim Brotherhood in Europe and the founder of the Muslim Association of Britain - a Muslim Brotherhood-tied Islamist organization in Great Britain. He spoke at a Muslim Arab Youth Association-Islamic Association for Palestine (MAYA-IAP) conference in 1992 in Oklahoma City:
Do not take Jews and Christians as allies. For they are allies to each other. Oh Brothers, the Palestinian cause is not of conflict of borders and land only. It is not even a conflict of human ideology and not over peace. Rather, it is an absolute clash of civilizations, between truth and falsehood. Between two conducts – one satanic, headed by Jews and their co-conspirators – and the other is religious, carried by Hamas, and the Islamic movement in particular, and the Islamic people in general who are behind it.
Lastly I am going to say something about Imam Hassan al-Banna, may he rest in peace, who had been trying to establish 70,000 fighters, and he started with the first battalion with 10,000 fighters, and today the Palestinians became strong fighting battalions. Let us stand and support this great nation and the future is for Islam. And I ask God's forgiveness for you and for me and the Muslims. We ask God to give victory to our brothers and we ask God to release the leader of the Intifada, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, praise be upon him.[1]
Another MAYA-IAP conference was held in Oklahoma City in December 1998. The main speaker at the event was Osama bin Laden's spiritual mentor Sheikh Abdullah Azzam. According to videotapes of the conference and other records, Islamic militants from around the globe converged in Oklahoma City to raise the banner of Jihad not only in Afghanistan but in Palestine and elsewhere. Azzam and other guest speakers, which included Hamas leader Muhammad Siyyam, militant cleric Ahmed Al-Qattan, radical cleric from Lebanon Sheikh Muharram Al-Aarifi, and a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, Mustapha Mashhour, exhorted the crowd to carry out terrorist attacks. According to records of the conference, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and other militant Islamic groups set up stands for recruiting and fundraising.[2]
[1] MAYA-IAP Conference, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, December 1992, http://www.investigativeproject.org/238/kamal-helbawy-maya-iap-1992
[2] MAYA-IAP Conference, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, December 1988.
