The Case of Burhan Hassan

Burhan Hassan, in 2005, after having received a certificate from the Abubakar mosque in Minneapolis. When he went missing, he was a senior in high school. By all accounts, he was a good student and was supposed to graduate on time in May. His mother wanted him to go to medical school. He disappeared Nov. 4, calling his mother two days later to say he was in Somalia. Courtesy of Osman Ahmed

Welcome HA readers and thanks for the link Hot Air.

In this undated photo released by the family at a news conference in December 2008, Burhan Hassan is seen. Hassan was one of many young Somali men who went missing from Minneapolis last year and according to his family was recruited by radical elements in Somalia. Hassan's family learned on Friday June 5, 2009 that the 17-year-old had been killed under mysterious circumstances and buried in Mogadishu. (AP Photo/Courtesy of Family) (AP)

A seeming example of the American dream. Fleeing violence prone Somalia his family brought him to America at the age of 4. Now at 17 years of age he ended up back in Somalia dying under mysterious circumstances:

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) -- Burhan Hassan was an infant when he left his homeland of Somalia. He grew up American, a bright student with dreams of becoming a doctor or lawyer. But now his family is trying to find out why the 17-year-old was killed under mysterious circumstances in Somalia.

Hassan was one of about a dozen young Somali men who have gone missing from the Minneapolis area over the last couple years -- recruited, their families say, by radical elements in Somalia. Relatives said they learned Friday that he had been killed and buried in Mogadishu, the Somali capital, but they had few details.

His death follows a suicide bombing carried out in that warring Horn of Africa country last October by another young Somali man from Minneapolis.''We believe he was killed because he would have been a key person in the investigation into the recruitment (of young Somali men) here in Minneapolis,'' said Hassan's uncle, Abdirizak Bihi. Bihi said his nephew was found shot in the head in an open area of the city.

Hassan's mother declined to comment Monday. But Bihi, her brother, said she's ''devastated, the whole family's devastated.''''We had a young kid, we put all the efforts in our life to bring him here,'' Bihi told The Associated Press.FBI Special Agent E.K. Wilson said he could not confirm whether Hassan had been killed. A State Department spokeswoman, Joanne Moore, had no firm information either.

There are reports that the FBI have been to Somalia to question, but nothing solid has been given to the press yet. As for being executed, my speculation is that he had gotten himself in over his head or perhaps he had a change of conscience while there. So who might have taken him?

But last November, Hassan disappeared at the age of 17. His mother reported him missing to police. Relatives said they feared he was recruited by al-Shabab, an extremist Islamist group considered by the U.S. State Department to be a terrorist organization with links to al-Qaida. Al-Shabab denies the links.Last October, a Minneapolis man, Shirwa Ahmed, carried out a suicide bombing as part of a series of coordinated attacks that targeted a U.N. compound, the Ethiopian consulate and the presidential palace in Hargeisa, capital of the Somaliland region. FBI Director Robert Mueller said in February that the bomber had probably been ''radicalized'' in the Twin Cities.

It was a cross between Columbine and Jihad. To be quite frank its sounds as if some terror/child predator organization was operating in the area:

The most recent disappearances happened last November, on Election Day. That's when 17-year-old Burhan Hassan and six of his friends seemed to vanish. As the rest of the Somali community in the Twin Cities' Cedar-Riverside neighborhood were watching the election returns, the boys slipped away, boarded a plane and headed to Africa.

"My sister called me and said Burhan is missing," says Abdirizak Bihi, Hassan's uncle. He runs a local youth center where all the Somali kids play basketball and video games after school.For more than a year, Bihi heard rumors about boys in the community suddenly going missing, but he didn't believe it. He thought it was all coffee-shop talk. Then his nephew disappeared."In the morning, [his mother] went to his room. Everything he had was gone," he says. (How terrifying)

The FBI is investigating whether Hassan and the other boys were recruited to fight in Somalia's civil war by al-Shabab or some other Somali Islamist group. At this point, terrorism experts disagree about how closely al-Shabab is tied to al-Qaida. Al-Shabab is on the State Department's list of terrorist organizations, but so far, it has confined its attacks to Africa.

The recruitment:

Like some of the other missing young people, Hassan had also attended the Abubakar As-Saddique Islamic Center in Minneapolis. Hassan had gone to the mosque for more than 10 years and was involved in a youth group there, another uncle told a U.S. Senate committee in March.

Officials of the mosque - the largest in Minnesota - have repeatedly denied accusations by families of some of the missing men that the mosque played a role in their decision to leave. The center's director, Omar Hurre, repeated on Monday that such allegations are "baseless."Hassan's relatives have said his disappearance came as a shock when the family discovered him missing Nov. 4, 2008.

In testimony to the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, another uncle, Osman Ahmed, said they first became suspicious when they got a message from Roosevelt High School saying Hassan had missed all his classes that day. He said the youth's mother checked his room and found that his luggage, clothes and passport were missing.Ahmed testified that all of the missing Somali-American youths he knew of who disappeared were not troubled kids or involved with gangs. On the contrary, he said, they embodied the hopes of their community."They were the doctors, lawyers, engineers, scientists and leaders of the future of our strong and prosperous nation," he said.

What a waste. Its clear that older men most likely provided the guidance and the teenagers formed their own social circle which re-reinforced itself to the point that getting shipped off to Somalia seemed like the right thing to do. In other words child abuse on a cult like scale. Of course its possible the kids were kidnapped to be brainwashed at a later date. Either way a crime against these teenagers of the most incredible magnitude has occurred. Now we have the Somali government, or whats left of it asking Somali-Americans not to come back as they are likely to end up fodder for terrorist organizations. For an in depth report from the Times check here.