Overview
- Mahmoud Amin Ya’qub Al‑Muhtadi, 33, a Gazan living in Lafayette, Louisiana, is charged with providing or attempting to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization and with visa fraud.
- Prosecutors allege he was an operative of the DFLP’s National Resistance Brigades who armed himself, recruited others and crossed into Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, with phone data placing him near Kibbutz Kfar Aza.
- Court filings cite intercepted calls in which he discussed the assault and describe false statements on a June 2024 U.S. visa application about militant ties, training and involvement in the attack.
- Authorities say he entered the United States through Dallas–Fort Worth on Sept. 12, 2024, lived in Tulsa and was located working in Lafayette in June 2025 before last week’s arrest.
- The case is being investigated by DOJ’s Joint Task Force October 7 and the FBI with assistance from Israeli and local U.S. agencies, and Magistrate Judge David Ayo ordered U.S. Marshals to reasonably accommodate his halal diet, fasting and daily prayers, with a detention hearing set for Wednesday.