A Toronto man has pleaded guilty to terrorism charges after using online fundraising platforms—allegedly meant to aid victims in Gaza—to funnel money to ISIS.
Thirty-four-year-old Khalilullah Yousuf pleaded guilty this week to two of three terrorism-related offences: financing terrorism and participating in terrorist group activities. He was sentenced to 12 years in prison.
“He admitted having created online fundraising campaigns, collected money, and transferred funds, in both cash and cryptocurrency, abroad to support the Islamic State,” wrote the Public Prosecution Service of Canada in a release.
In addition, Yousuf produced and spread pro-ISIS propaganda on social media with the goal of radicalizing and recruiting others to the terrorist group. He also created content justifying terrorist attacks against foreign nationals in Afghanistan.
An ISIS facilitator reportedly sent Yousuf photos of weapons, ammunition, and an ISIS flag to show how the funds he raised were being used.
“This is the ‘new Canada,’” Toronto lawyer Ari Goldkind told True North. “This is the disgusting country that we’ve turned into. Not only do we allow this but we have a new Liberal government that supports this. This isn’t somebody who just got here on a plane yesterday, this is what we pretend to call a Canadian citizen.”
He said that Yousuf is the “opposite of everything that any right-thinking and sane Canadian would say represents citizenship.”
Goldkind added that while he “didn’t know” whether the 12-year sentence was enough, what he is sure of is that Yousuf is far from a “unicorn.”
“This is the atmosphere after October 7. Before, this was all hidden and kept on the down low but it’s now all being done in the open and the criminal justice system has been absolutely silent on it until just recently,” he said. “The Toronto Police have been silent. We have this bubble law that’s coming from our moronic city council, as if Christians and Jews are surrounding Mosques, or atheists are surrounding churches.”
Yousuf had been previously arrested and charged last December along with three Americans for his connection to an alleged scheme that posted links seeking donations for purported humanitarian causes, which were then handed over to Islamic State fighters.
He was also arrested in July 2023 following a two-year investigation involving the RCMP’s Integrated National Security Enforcement Team, the FBI, and Spain’s Guardia Civil.
Goldkind said he was happy to see both the judge and the crown “taking this one seriously,” but believes the problem at large is a “cancer metastasizing Canada,” which the country is doing nothing to halt.
There have been a wide array of people accused of raising funds in Canada to finance terrorist organizations abroad, ranging from Hamas to Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tigers. However, there are seldom prosecutions.
Yousuf’s case is just the latest in a string of ISIS-related arrests across Canada
The Organization for the Prevention of Violence released a report Monday which said ISIS had “re-emerged in Canada after a lull following the fall of the caliphate in Syria and Iraq.”
“Recent arrests suggest a growing interest in carrying out attacks within Canada, with an increasing number of young people involved,” it said.
“In my view, we are very dangerous territory. We’re on the ropes,” continued Goldkind. “This guy is just one guy amongst thousands doing this. We all know it’s happening, we all feel it and none of us are willing to say much about it. It will get worse.”
Yousuf raised $35,000 for ISIS while claiming that the online fundraising drives were “for the good people in the Gaza Strip” and for Ramadan as well as for the Muslim holiday Eid.
Additionally, he acquired money through unemployment insurance and COVID-19 benefits.
“This is the mocking, the laughing stock of what citizenship in Canada and our immigration policy is,” said Goldkind. “Our destiny is our demographics. This man is not an outlier, he is not a rarity. He has simply been pinched for something that thousands of people in this country are doing everyday. A short and simple trip to Western Union will confirm that.”