Daveed Gartenstein-Ross

By Michael Jacobson
Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Jan. 2010

Daveed Gartenstein-Ross’s views on radical Islam shifted after he left his job at al-Haramain and went to law school across the country at New York University.69

For Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, who worked at the al-Haramain Foundation’s Oregon office for a year before law school, a change in circumstances allowed him to reconsider his once-radical beliefs. While at al-Haramain, a nongovernmental organization with headquarters in Saudi Arabia that was later designated by the United States as a provider of “financial and material support to al-Qaida,”82 Gartenstein-Ross was surrounded by extremists and discouraged by friends from interacting with those outside the organization. In an environment in which it was difficult to challenge those espousing extremist views, Gartenstein-Ross became quite radical in his own right. After leaving al-Haramain to go to law school in New York, he began to question the belief system he had adopted during his time at al-Haramain, eventually rejecting it entirely.83

69. Interview with Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, July 30, 2009.
82. Press Room, U.S. Department of the Treasury, June 19, 2008, http://treas.gov/press/releases/hp1043.htm.
83. Interview with Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, July 30, 2009.

See the full report here.