Qatar’s Continued Hosting and Supporting Extremists and Terrorists

(New York) – Certain senior Hamas leaders were reportedly asked to leave Qatar. If true, Qatar should be commended for finally taking action to expel known extremist actors. Nonetheless, Qatar must do more to demonstrate it has changed its policy of hosting, supporting, and protecting terrorist operatives and financiers, many of whom are highlighted in the Counter Extremism Project’s HARBORS Campaign: Qatar.

Qatar has a long history of harboring terrorists from various groups, including Hamas, the Taliban, al-Qaeda, and the Muslim Brotherhood. CEP has profiled 12 Qatari-based sanction-designated or wanted individuals, including:

• Yusuf al-Qaradawi is an Islamist theologian and the unofficial ideologue of the Muslim Brotherhood who has repeatedly called for suicide bombing attacks targeting U.S. and Israeli forces. The Doha-based cleric is one of Sunni Islam’s most influential scholars. He is the subject of an INTERPOL warrant and is banned from entering the United States, the United Kingdom, and France due to his reputation as a violence-inciting Islamist.
• Khalifa Muhammad Turki al-Subaiy is a U.S.-designated terrorist financier and facilitator. He has allegedly funneled hundreds of thousands of dollars to al-Qaeda senior leaders in South Asia, including 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Subaiy has also funded the transit of al-Qaeda recruits to South Asia for terrorist training. In October 2014, a Telegraph report alleged that Subaiy was funding al-Qaeda-linked terrorism in Iraq and Syria.
• Abd al-Rahman bin 'Umayr al-Nu'aymi is a U.S. and U.N.-sanctioned terrorist financier. The U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned Nu’aymi in December 2013 for providing financial support to al-Qaeda, Lebanon-based Asbat al-Ansar, al-Qaeda in Iraq, and al-Shabab. As a chief al-Qaeda financier, Nu’aymi has channeled millions of dollars from primarily Qatari-based donors to al-Qaeda affiliates in Yemen, Syria, Somalia, and Iraq.
• Fazl Mohammad Mazloom is a U.N.-sanctioned senior Taliban leader. During the 9/11 attacks, Mazloom was the Taliban’s Deputy Minister of Defense and commander of all Taliban troops in northern Afghanistan. Mazloom was also wanted by the United Nations for possible war crimes and stands accused of administering a series of massacres targeting Shiite and Tajik Sunnis Muslims in central and northern Afghanistan.

To learn more about CEP’s HARBORS Campaign: Qatar, including other extremist and terrorist leaders and groups in Qatar, please click here.