OPINION:
A man born in Senegal walked into an Austin bar late Sunday night and opened fire. Reportedly, Ndiaga Diagne wore a “Property of Allah” hoodie over an Iranian flag T-shirt as he gunned down three patrons and wounded 14 others before he was killed by police.
Texas may seem like an unlikely place for someone to shout “Allahu akbar” before going on a killing spree, but when the border is wide-open, anyone can stroll in. Diagne entered on a tourist visa in 2000 and illegally overstayed his welcome. He married into a green card in 2006, obtained citizenship and divorced his wife in 2022.
His story isn’t unique, as 1.2 million sub-Saharan Africans have entered the country since 2010. Many of an extreme Islamist bent flocked to the Lone Star State, where jihad-friendly enclaves operate under the radar. The state has 650 Islamic nonprofits, at least a quarter of which embrace radical influences, according to a report published last month by the Middle East Forum.
The most famous of these was the Dallas-based Holy Land Foundation. This was the largest “charity” of its kind until federal investigators exposed it as a front funneling millions of dollars into overseas terrorist groups such as Hamas. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals summarized the facts as it upheld convictions for the group’s leaders.
“The Government produced voluminous evidence obtained from covert surveillance, searches, and testimony showing a web of complex relationships connecting the defendants to Hamas and its various sub-groups. The financial link between the Holy Land Foundation and Hamas was established at the Foundation’s genesis and continued until it was severed by the Government’s intervention in 2001,” the judges wrote.
The foundation didn’t go to much effort to conceal its activities. The beneficiary of the “charitable” donations had the code name “Sister Samah” — Hamas spelled backward. Multiple mosques helped raise funds, revealing how jihadi ideology is being pushed under the cover of religion inside the United States.
President Obama flooded the country with millions of unvetted refugees from Islamic nations without pausing to verify whether they intended to adopt our ways, or whether their intention was to destroy decadent Western society from within. No wonder so many have proved willing to prey on innocents by shooting or stabbing them in public places.
The Middle East Forum identified several radical nonprofits receiving at least $16 million in grants from the Texas government, including $1 million to outfits run by devotees of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The late supreme leader even has fan clubs, such as the Islamic Education Center in Houston, which celebrates his accomplishments and teachings.
Among the legitimate immigrants who want to participate in the American dream are those seeking to establish a separate society that advances their own political and cultural agenda. In a conference last year, Plano, Texas, Muslim scholar Yasir Qadhi described how Islam is destined to take over Malmo, Sweden, within the next 20 years. He predicted the same fate for the United States.
“We are less than 1%, if even that, of the country. So, that is a weakness. … We do have our secret weapon. What is our secret weapon? Keep having babies. … What we do in the next 30 years will dictate Islam for the next 300 years in this country,” Mr. Qadhi explained.
Those who prefer a constitutional republic founded on the values of free speech, religious freedom and entrepreneurial capitalism ought to be concerned. The administration is right to halt the importation of people from countries that despise the West.
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