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More important, the charity made travel possible for jihadists, helping at least nine people move from Afghanistan to Bosnia, including senior al Qaeda leaders. Sometimes Benevolence’s leadership knew the people and their purpose in traveling, but it wasn’t always formal. If someone was known to the charity or came with an introduction, this person would get help, no questions asked, usually in the form of papers stating that the traveler worked for Benevolence, which could then be used to obtain a work visa at the desired destination.51

Overseas, Benevolence served as an intelligence hub for al Qaeda, in addition to its other functions. The Benevolence office in Sarajevo archived and digitized a massive collection of al Qaeda documents, including records of the organization’s founding and personnel. It also created detailed reports on the activities of the mujahideen and their relationships with one another and with suspected American intelligence agents.52

The Sarajevo office’s greatest intelligence coup, however, was the cultivation of a high-level mole in the Bosnian government who funneled hundreds of pages of classified documents to al Qaeda through the Benevolence staff. It was a devastating counterintelligence success, collecting detailed logs of phone conversations intercepted by the Bosnian government, reports on the activities of the mujahideen, and even highly classified CIA cables.

One such cable was particularly sensitive: a request from the CIA to Bosnian intelligence for the detention of Anwar Shaban, the commander of the foreign mujahideen who was a senior leader in Omar Abdel Rahman’s Islamic Group and had extensive ties to Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda. Shortly after the request was sent, Shaban was mysteriously assassinated.53

The Benevolence network was part of the fabric of the American jihadist movement. The CARE International office in Boston used Benevolence to distribute its funds in many cases, along with another Chicago-based charity called the Global Relief Foundation. And both CARE and Benevolence were intertwined with Mohammed Zaki’s American Islamic Group.54

Zaki’s second-in-command was an influential jihadist propagandist named Kifah Jayyousi, a Jordanian of Palestinian descent with an unfortunate tendency to giggle at inappropriate moments. Jayyousi immigrated to the United States in 1979 and became a naturalized American citizen.55

Through Jayyousi, the American Islamic Group maintained close ties with CARE in Boston. CARE’s directors sponsored speaking tours by Jayyousi to raise funds and recruit fighters for Bosnia and Chechnya. During speeches at Boston University and MIT in 1996, Jayyousi regaled audiences with tales of Russian atrocities against Muslims and showed videotaped battles of the Chechen mujahideen. Tapes of Jayyousi’s lectures were also distributed by Muslim Students Association branches around the country.56

Like CARE, AIG focused on recruitment and fund-raising for mujahideen overseas. Jayyousi personally recruited fighters in addition to leveraging his speeches, taped lectures, and AIG publications in the service of jihad. The cell also moved thousands of dollars among various other charities that supported the mujahideen, including a Hamas front known as the Holy Land Foundation and mujahideen support organizations functioning in Bosnia, Kosovo, Chechnya, Azerbaijan, Libya, Egypt, and Somalia.

Pretty much any front was all right, one member of the organization commented during a meeting with Zaki and Jayyousi. “As long as there is slaughtering, we’re with them. If there’s no slaughtering, [ … ] that’s it, buzz off.”57

This bloodthirstiness was typical of AIG, especially after Zaki’s death. Unlike CARE, which was more narrowly focused on the guerrilla combat of military jihad, AIG was at times unabashedly supportive of terrorism. Jayyousi published a newsletter known as the Islam Report, which was initially filled with details of the terrorism trial of Omar