Why is an Iranian Bank Able To Do Business in the US?

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Middle East Forum has an investigation into the financing behind a CAIR building in D.C. that touched on something interesting.

A new Middle East Forum investigation reveals that the Islamic Development Bank (ISDB), a multilateral bank whose top shareholders include the governments of Iran, Qatar, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia, has disbursed $7.7 million to finance “CAIR Plaza,” a residential and commercial development in Washington, D.C., designed to provide the Council on American-Islamic Relations with rental income for decades. CAIR’s own website states that the group “does not receive funding from foreign organizations or governments.”

…The investigation also documents the ISDB’s wider American footprint: $13.1 million across 44 K-12 schools, including a North Texas school the Forum previously found was established and staffed by Hamas-aligned operatives; a $90 million dormitory tower in New York for the Turken Foundation, an organization founded and managed by members of Turkish President Erdoğan’s family; and $7 million pledged to a residential project of the Islamic Center of Irving in Texas.

The ISDB is tethered to the Organization of the Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and lists Iran as the second largest shareholder of the institution with 5.4 billion and 8.25%… behind only Saudi Arabia.

FDD had previously noted Iran’s penetration of the American educational system via ISDB. A baseline question is why isn’t ISDB subject to sanctions that would prevent it from doing business in the United States? The answer presumably is that the Saudis are ISDB’s biggest shareholders and the Qataris are the third biggest shareholders and our elected officials don’t want to offend them.

Meanwhile, ISDB is able to finance America’s enemies within.

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Daniel Greenfield

Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center, is an investigative journalist and writer focusing on the radical Left and Islamic terrorism. Daniel became CEO of the David Horowitz Freedom Center in 2025.

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