Adam Yahiye Gadahn - Conversion To Islam

Conversion To Islam

While living with his grandparents in West Floral Park, Santa Ana, Gadahn described himself as having a "yawning emptiness", and he sought ways "to fill that void." He explored Christianity on the Internet, radio, and locally, but later said that he found evangelical Christianity's "apocalyptic ramblings" to be "paranoid" and hollow. In 1995, at age 17, Gadahn began studying Islam at the Islamic Society of Orange County. Members of Gadahn's study group were young fundamentalists who "targeted the mosque's chairman, Haitham Bundakji," whom they referred to as Danny the Jew for his practice of "wearing Western clothes and being overly friendly with Jews."

Gadahn converted to Islam later that year, and shortly thereafter posted an essay to the USC website describing his conversion, entitled "Becoming a Muslim." According to his parents, Adam was "arrested and convicted of assaulting his former mentor Haitham Bundakji in May 1997." He served two days in jail, but his failure to do 40 hours of community services leaves a warrant for his arrest active.

Gadahn reportedly moved to Pakistan in 1998, where he married an Afghan refugee and maintained intermittent contact with his family until March 2001, when all contact with his family stopped. He told his parents he had been working as a journalist while in Pakistan —spending time in both Karachi and Peshawar— presumably a euphemism for his media propaganda efforts for al-Qaeda. He began supporting jihadi causes in the late 1990s.