Omar Amanat Home About Contact Since 9/11, most of the media attention given to the topic of Muslim-Christian interaction has focused on conflict. A bias of sensationalism has thus overshadowed the positive efforts being made to ameliorate ethnic and religious strife in the U.S. and abroad. Omar Amanat is one American Muslim who is out to change that. Until recently, Mr. Amanat was better known as a successful entrepreneur in the electronic brokerage industry. He was founder and CEO of Tradescape, which grew to become the largest day-trading firm in the U.S. and was sold in 2002 to E*Trade for consideration worth $280 million. Tradescape’s largest branch office was in the World Trade Center. Remarkably, every one of the company’s employees was able to escape the building before it collapsed on the morning of September 11, 2001, but the event prompted a long period of reflection for Mr. Amanat. During that time, he read books about minority self-image and its relation to violence and mass media, and spoke with people such as Lee Hamilton, vice-chair of the 9/11 Commission, and Thomas Friedman, columnist for The New York Times and author of The World Is Flat. The culmination of that process was a decision by Mr. Amanat to channel his financial prowess into the creation of large-scale social change and positive minority images in television and feature films. Such a decision by a person of significant stature in the American Muslim community has not gone unnoticed. Islamica Magazine featured Mr. Amanat as one of 10 young Muslim visionaries who "represent the best that the Muslim community in America has to offer." Mr. Amanat’s first media venture was the financing of Bridges TV, the first American Muslim television channel. But his primary focus is on the production and distribution of films. He has founded or helped finance several film companies, among them Blue Planet Films, LLC, and Groundswell Productions. For more information on Mr. Amanat and his cinematic and philanthropic projects, please visit www.OmarAmanat.com.