Fred Doesn't CAIR

To Fred's great credit, he has no blinders on about CAIR and is quite willing to speak up. Of more importance, he has no blinders on about those funding CAIR. Fred not only speaks out against CAIR, but also its financial backers - Saudi Arabia and the UAE. If ever the problem of radical Islam will be addressed in the West, then the first step is to acknowledge the role of our supposed Middle East allies in fanning the flames of radicalism in the West.

This from Fred:

. . . For years, CAIR has claimed to represent millions of American Muslims. In fact, they claim to represent more Muslims in America then [there are Muslims] in America. This has alarmed Americans in general as the group often seems to be more aligned with our enemies than us -- which isn't surprising as it spun off from a group funded by Hamas. As you know, Hamas has been waging a terrorist war against Israel and calls for its total destruction. It also promises to see America destroyed. Nowadays, Hamas is busy murdering its Palestinian political rivals.

Even with this history, and CAIR's conspicuous failure to condemn Hamas by name, it has been treated as if represents Muslim Americans by our own government. The good news is that the financial support CAIR claims to have among American Muslims is a myth. We know this because The Washington Times got hold of the group's IRS tax records.

CAIR's dues-paying membership has shrunk 90 percent since 9/11 . . . Clearly, America's Muslims are not supporting this group -- and I'm happy to hear about it.

Of course, every silver lining seems to have a cloud; and this cloud is that CAIR's spending is running about $3 million a year. They’ve opened 25 new chapters in major cities across the country even as their dues shrank to a pittance. The question is; who’s funding CAIR?

CAIR's not saying. The New York Times earlier this year reported that the backing is from "wealthy Persian Gulf governments" including the UAE and Saudi Arabia. Obviously, we have a bigger problem here than the one with CAIR.

Read the entire story here. If you read Robert Baer's book "Sleeping With The Devil," he thoroughly documents on Saudi money has had a horrendously corrupting influence on our government, Republican and Democrat alike. Part of this has played out in governmental silence about the Saudi's export of radical Wahhabi / Salafi Islam throughout the Western World. Part of this has played out in the government's refusal to acknowledge the Saudi's destructive influence. And part of it has played out in calling our enemy "Islamofacism" rather then Wahhabi / Salafi Islam and Khomeinist Shia'ism.

This has all been in an effort to make sure that the Saudi's are angred or upset and decide to turn off the oil and money spigot. But this facade has to end. And the bottom line is that the Saudi's need the U.S. economically and as a bullwark against Khomeinist Shia'ism. It is time for our leaders to take on radical Islam at its source. And that source begins with Saudi Arabia. Thus, I salute Fred for this first step.

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Jasser Skewers CAIR & Its Political Islamist Agenda

The Washington Times ran a story recently about the Council on American Islamic Relations, nominally a civil rights organizaton that purports to represent American Muslims. The Washington Times noted that CAIR's membership had declined by 90% since 9-11, and that they were managing to stay afloat by the good graces of 12 unnamed donors who contributed almost the entirety of CAIR's 300 million dollar operating budget. CAIR responded here, claiming with numerous adjectives the article to be incorrect, though failing contest any of the facts with contrary facts. M. Zudi Jasser, former U.S. Naval Officer and President of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, quite eloquently takes issue with CAIR and their response to the Washington Times article:

The Washington Times printed a report by Audrey Hudson this week, “CAIR Membership falls 90% since 9/11”, discussing CAIR’s (Council on American Islamic Relations) membership numbers as disclosed on CAIR’s own 990 Tax returns. Within hours, CAIR described the report as a ‘hit-piece’ in a hate-filled rant of a press release and action alert. A review of the Times piece reveals simple reporting of data from CAIR tax forms on their dwindling membership numbers, donor numbers, and yet increasing funds.

The piece quotes Parvez Ahmed, CAIR Chairman, on the countervailing increase in the number of CAIR chapters around the country during the same period post 9/11. It also cites the recent Department of Justice (DOJ) listing of CAIR as an un-indicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation (HLF) HAMAS fundraising case. The DOJ refers therein to CAIR’s leadership and origins as, “members of the U.S. Muslim Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee and/or its organization.” For all CAIR’s objections, there was no refutation of any of this.

With the elaboration of these facts and more, CAIR still ran wild describing the Times reporter as “having a vendetta against our organization and the American Muslim community since she was barred from a recent CAIR news conference because of her sloppy and agenda-driven reporting.” With a report revealing that its national membership figures reported to the IRS are less than 1700 members in 2006, they still have the audacity to say that criticism of CAIR is equivalent to criticism of over 3 million Muslims in the “American Muslim community”.

This is, clear and simple, the modus operands of “political Islam” and its Islamist operatives. This is also more than likely one of the reasons for their dwindling membership numbers. While they may occasionally be doing good work for the civil rights of certain Muslims in America on selected cases, their Islamist political agenda and their persistence in the claim that criticism of CAIR is akin to criticism of all American Muslims is dishonest, deceptive, and a hijacking of our faith community.

Rather than respond with a semblance of a valid intellectual discourse or refutation of the ideas and facts contained in the June 12 report, CAIR preferred to respond with further empty screeds of hyperbole, victimization, and false claims of religious intolerance and hate-mongering. They claim to be working toward eliminating hate. Yet, they have a wild imagination of hate and rush to claim victimization as they deflect any substantive debate. This actually makes a compelling case for the fact that their attention to perceived incidents of intolerance for Islam and Muslims is a means to an ends of the empowerment of political Islam. In fact Nihad Awad told a gathering of Muslims just that in April in a discussion on their ‘flying imam’ lawsuit in Virginia at ADAMS (All Dulles Area Muslim Society),

Reporting to an organization like CAIR is important, because it is empowering. It is empowering to the Muslims themselves who report, it is empowering to the organization, and it is important to the status of Muslims within the United States. Also it is a powerful tool and message to the government and the legislators, to those who make the laws in the country, to know that this phenomenon has to be dealt with, it has to be dealt with effectively, and results have to be seen….

CAIR scavenges for claims of civil rights abuses not necessarily just to try and humbly build bridges to the greater American community. Is their agenda, in fact, more about empowering Islamists and intimidating non-Islamists?

The rule of law and the protections of our Constitution are certainly the cornerstone of the protection of our rights of religious freedom in America. But there is a fine line between the legitimate representation of individual Muslims whose rights of religious freedom have been infringed and the blatant manipulation of a system for the advancement of a variant political ideology at the expense of some victims.

True to form in the usual Islamist fallback to public criticism, CAIR claimed that the Washington Times was ‘anti-Muslim’ and ‘anti-Islam’. They use the protection of religion when the facts are not on their side. They use the discourse of politics when they want to push forth their Islamist agenda with the presumption of speaking for all Muslims. They will delve into the political only on their own terms in both foreign and domestic policy but when they are on the receiving end of political criticism they run for cover under the guise of victimization.

Why all of the venom directed at the Washington Times or at their reporter, Audrey Hudson-- one of the few national reporters willing to peel the Islamist onion and look deeper into Islamist organizations like CAIR and their ideologies? There is absolutely nothing in the Times report anti-Islamic or anti-Muslim. It is simply critical of CAIR. To say that CAIR is synonymous with Islam or Muslims is Islamism and gives all Muslim non-members of CAIR (the vast majority of American Muslims) short shrift.

It is long overdue for America and especially for Muslims to discuss why such political discourse and reporting could ever be described by an organization like CAIR as being anti-Muslim or anti-Islamic. In fact, a more cogent argument could be made that such reports are pro-Muslim and pro-Islam since they ultimately rescue most Muslims from the grip of Islamists and Wahhabists. Such discussion of realities and ideologies will go a long way toward preserving a positive image of Islam and the inclusiveness of all Muslims under a purely spiritual Islam devoid of a political agenda.

Nothing is more clarifying than, CAIR’s Ibrahim Hooper’s own quotation in their Action Alert,

“It is CAIR’s principled and effective defense of the American Muslim community and our criticism of failed foreign and domestic policies that have made us the target of these scurrilous attacks. We will not be intimidated or silenced by hate-mongers.”

Herein, CAIR claims to be defenders of the entire Muslim community. Where did I sign up for that? Herein, CAIR admits to its primary active critique of American domestic and foreign policy on behalf of the entire American Muslim community. Thus, CAIR and so many of the other American Islamist organizations are about much more than simply “defending the civil rights of Muslims”. If only they stuck to civil rights, less Muslims would have problems with them. They are about the penetration of political Islam into our foreign and domestic policy under the guise of civil rights. In fact, their constant refrain about intimidation and hate-mongering is in fact a cultivation of their own industry. The lawsuit they are sponsoring on behalf of the ‘flying imams’ in Shqeirat v. U.S. Airways, et al, is much more about intimidation than about bridge-building or religious freedom as AIFD has noted.

The next step in this assessment of constituency is to understand their ideology. So much of the substantive criticism of CAIR arises from their unwillingness to be specific in condemnations of radical Muslims, radical organizations, and despotic regimes. Perhaps their dwindling numbers are in fact an ideological problem which does not speak to the majority of American Muslims. Honest debate will have to include a discussion of CAIR’s and other American Islamist organization responses to the following questions which I have been querying for a long time.

1- Will CAIR work to dismantle and lead an organized effort against terrorist organizations and individuals by name beginning with Al Qaeda, Islamic Jihad, Jamaat al-Islamiya, and HAMAS to name just a few of the radical Islamist enemies of America? Will they name and ideologically engage the extremism of the Wahhabists of Saudi Arabia, the theocrats of Iran or the despots of Syria, Egypt or Sudan, and the litany of other dictatorships in the Muslim world? Empty generic condemnations of terrorism are of no impact.

2- Will CAIR acknowledge that political Islam (Islamism) whether militant or not, is the toxin which feeds the terrorism committed by radicalized Muslims?

3- Will CAIR acknowledge the need out of honesty for a faith-based civil rights organization to equally focus upon the civil rights abuses of Muslims by other Muslims as well as by non-Muslims whether it occurs in mosques, Muslim organizations, or so-called Muslim nations? A dismissal of Muslim abuses is hypocrisy.

4- Will CAIR acknowledge that counter-terrorism is a greater public responsibility to the organized American Muslim community than the obsession with the protection of our civil rights? Is it not the primary role of Muslim American organizations to lead the ideological war against radical Islamists? Isn’t this the number one issue on the mind of most Americans in 2007? Non-Muslims can do nothing to deconstruct this poisonous ideology. Our fellow Americans living in fear for their security are looking for us to lead this fight. The credibility of Muslims is suffering deeply as a result of the complete denial of this responsibility by groups like CAIR. In fact, there may be no better way to preserve our rights than by leading an ideological movement against political Islam and militant Islamism.

5- Will CAIR join anti-Islamist Muslims in declaring that the “Islamic state” regardless of its democratic processes is in principle significantly inferior to a “pluralistic Constitutional democracy under God” like the United States? Will CAIR declare the concept of a global Caliphate as archaic and no longer relevant to Muslims in the 21st century? Is the concept of the Muslim “ummah” or “nation” archaic?

6- Will CAIR join what was described in the Pew poll as the 49% of Muslims who felt that the mosque was not the place for the discussion of politics? Will they then help AIFD expose political sermons and their agenda around the United States? Will they moreover call upon our fellow co-religionists to fully and unequivocally separate the spiritual from the political? If they will not, will they recognize that they only represent Islamists and those who believe in political Islam—the remaining 51% according to Pew?

7- How can they honestly claim to speak for anyone beyond their membership and donors?

The Washington Times piece about CAIR was not a hit-piece nor was it anti-Muslim or anti-Islamic. It begins the long overdue debate about the agenda of organizations like CAIR and where they stand with regard to political Islam and these questions. Soon, mainstream media and government leaders are going to need finally to begin to ignore the intimidation tactics of organizations like CAIR and to engage political Islam on the questions above.

They need to do so without fear of violating political correctness or offending pious Muslims. Spiritual Islam and non-Islamist Muslims in fact still are often at the mercy of Islamists, not just in America but across the globe. This is often not only due to the passivity of the majority of non-activist Muslims but to the propping up by government and the MSM of Islamists. We saw this in the recent refusal of PBS to air ABG Films, Inc. documentary, Islam v Islamists. Many anti-Islamist Muslims yearn for the day when the personal domain of the faith of Islam is not poisoned by any national domestic and foreign policy agendas of Islamist organizations like CAIR. American political discourse by activist Muslims should be all about our common national interests and universal humanitarian principles and not about being Muslim, Islamic, or being victims. The Muslims who cannot make this distinction may as well form overt Islamic political parties and make it more obvious as to their intentions and platforms when it comes to American domestic and foreign policy.

Read the entire story here.

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CAIR's Dwindling Support In America

There are polls, there is spin, and then there is objective fact. It is often impossible to winnow away the first two to get to the latter - but not today, at least as far as it is possilbe to identify support for the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) among American Muslims. The fact is that American Muslims have been jumping ship from CAIR ever since 9-11, as membership in the organization has dwindled by 90% to less then 1,700 members today. Their dues generate only $58,750 for CAIR. The only thing keeping CAIR afloat at the moment - and flush with a $3,000,000 operating budget to pursue its radical Islamist agenda - are the donations of twelve "private individuals." There can be little doubt that, if we identify those donors, we will find a direct link to Ridyah. The Washington Times has the story:

. . . Asked about the decline, Parvez Ahmed, CAIR board chairman, pointed to the number of individual donors to the organization.

"We are proud that our grass-roots support in the American Muslim community has allowed CAIR to grow from having eight chapters and offices in 2001 to having 33 today," Mr. Ahmed said.

The self-described civil liberties organization for Muslims seeks to portray "a positive image of Islam" through public relations and the media, but has instead alienated some by defending questionable accusations of discrimination.

Critics of the organization say they are not surprised membership is sagging, and that a recent decision by the Justice Department to name CAIR as "unindicted co-conspirators" in a federal case against another foundation charged with providing funds to a terrorist group could discourage new members.

M. Zuhdi Jasser, director of the American-Islamic Forum for Democracy, says the sharp decline in membership calls into question whether the organization speaks for 7 million American Muslims, as the group has claimed.

"This is the untold story in the myth that CAIR represents the American Muslim population. They only represent their membership and donors," Mr. Jasser said.

Read the whole story here. This augers well for Muslims in America. CAIR's agenda is to promote Salafi Islam and to drive a wedge between Americans and American Muslims. The fact that American Muslims are largely rejecting this message is good news indeed. Now it is time for our government to stop working with CAIR and promoting their agenda from above.

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Tawfiq Hamid, the Canard of Islamaphobia, and Combatting Salafi Islam

Tawfiq Hamid, a former member of Ayman al Zawahiri's terrorist organization Jemaah Islamiya, has spent the last twenty years of his life to modifying Wahhabi Islam and bringing it peacefully into the 21st century. In a recent article for the WSJ, Mr. Hamid examines the canard of "Islamaphobia" and the hypocrisy of Salafist Islam, suggesting that the cure must lie with modifying some of the beliefs of Salafi dogma:

Islamic organizations regularly accuse non-Muslims of "Islamophobia," a fear and disdain for everything Islamic. On May 17, this accusation bubbled up again as foreign ministers from the Organization of the Islamic Conference called Islamophobia "the worst form of terrorism." These ministers also warned, according to the Arab News, that this form of discrimination would cause millions of Muslims in Western countries, "many of whom were already underprivileged," to be "further alienated."

In America, perhaps the most conspicuous organization to persistently accuse opponents of Islamophobia is the Council of American Islamic Relations. . .

It may seem bizarre, but Islamic reformers are not immune to the charge of "Islamophobia" either. For 20 years, I have preached a reformed interpretation of Islam that teaches peace and respects human rights. I have consistently spoken out--with dozens of other Muslim and Arab reformers--against the mistreatment of women, gays and religious minorities in the Islamic world. We have pointed out the violent teachings of Salafism and the imperative of Westerners to protect themselves against it.

Yet according to CAIR's Michigan spokeswoman, Zeinab Chami, I am "the latest weapon in the Islamophobe arsenal." If standing against the violent edicts of Shariah law is "Islamophobic," then I will treat her accusation as a badge of honor.

Muslims must ask what prompts this "phobia" in the first place. When we in the West examine the worldwide atrocities perpetrated daily in the name of Islam, it is vital to question if we--Muslims--should lay the blame on others for Islamophobia or if we should first look hard at ourselves.

According to a recent Pew Global Attitudes survey, "younger Muslims in the U.S. are much more likely than older Muslim Americans to say that suicide bombing in the defense of Islam can be at least sometimes justified." About one out of every four American Muslims under 30 think suicide bombing in defense of Islam is justified in at least some circumstances. Twenty-eight percent believe that Muslims did not carry out the 9/11 attacks and 32% declined to answer that question.

While the survey has been represented in the media as proof of moderation among American Muslims, the actual results should yield the opposite conclusion. If, as the Pew study estimates, there are 2.35 million Muslims in America, that means there are a substantial number of people in the U.S. who think suicide bombing is sometimes justified. Similarly, if 5% of American Muslims support al Qaeda, that's more than 100,000 people.

To bring an end to Islamophobia, we must employ a holistic approach that treats the core of the disease. It will not suffice to merely suppress the symptoms. It is imperative to adopt new Islamic teachings that do not allow killing apostates (Redda Law). Islamic authorities must provide mainstream Islamic books that forbid polygamy and beating women. Accepted Islamic doctrine should take a strong stand against slavery and the raping of female war prisoners, as happens in Darfur under the explicit canons of Shariah ("Ma Malakat Aimanikum"). Muslims should teach, everywhere and universally, that a woman's testimony in court counts as much as a man's, that women should not be punished if they marry whom they please or dress as they wish.

We Muslims should publicly show our strong disapproval for the growing number of attacks by Muslims against other faiths and against other Muslims. Let us not even dwell on 9/11, Madrid, London, Bali and countless other scenes of carnage. It has been estimated that of the two million refugees fleeing Islamic terror in Iraq, 40% are Christian, and many of them seek a haven in Lebanon, where the Christian population itself has declined by 60%. Even in Turkey, Islamists recently found it necessary to slit the throats of three Christians for publishing Bibles.
Of course, Islamist attacks are not limited to Christians and Jews. Why do we hear no Muslim condemnation of the ongoing slaughter of Buddhists in Thailand by Islamic groups? . . .

Islamophobia could end when masses of Muslims demonstrate in the streets against videos displaying innocent people being beheaded with the same vigor we employ against airlines, Israel and cartoons of Muhammad. It might cease when Muslims unambiguously and publicly insist that Shariah law should have no binding legal status in free, democratic societies.

It is well past time that Muslims cease using the charge of "Islamophobia" as a tool to intimidate and blackmail those who speak up against suspicious passengers and against those who rightly criticize current Islamic practices and preachings. Instead, Muslims must engage in honest and humble introspection. Muslims should--must--develop strategies to rescue our religion by combating the tyranny of Salafi Islam and its dreadful consequences. Among more important outcomes, this will also put an end to so-called Islamophobia.

Read the entire story here.

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Congrats to Imam Talal Eid & the Bush Administration

Imam Talal Eid, a 54 year old native of Lebanon, today became the first Muslim cleric appointed to the U.S. Commission on International Religous Freedom, an organization which which monitors overseas conditions and makes policy recommendations to the president, State Department and Congress. I must admit, I was sharpening my fingers for a highly critical piece, but all that I have found from the news and from blogs indicates that Imam Eid is precisely the type of moderate voice that our administration needs to be singling out and amplifying. For example, this from a Boston-area newspaper in 2005:

Mosque leaders bar Imam Eid from pulpit

Imam Talal Eid was at the Islamic Center of New England's Quincy mosque for the Friday service, as he said he would be. But he preached no sermon and led no prayers.

Moving quickly to enforce a resignation Imam Eid claimed isn't valid, the center's board of directors barred him from the pulpit Friday and sent a board member to act as imam in his place.

. . . [Imam Eia, a] nationally-known native of Lebanon resigned in January, to protest what he said was a move by a hostile board majority to limit his duties as overall religious director for the center's two mosques, in Quincy and Sharon.

Imam Hafiz Masood, a native of Pakistan, has led worship services in Sharon since 1998.

Imam Eid's supporters, most of whom are affiliated with the Quincy mosque, say critics have hounded him for years for being too moderate and too involved with interfaith programs. Zaidi and other board officers deny that's the case.

. . . The dispute has plunged New England's oldest, most diverse Muslim community into the worst crisis of its 41-year history, with charges that conservatives are maneuvering to take control and counter-charges that Imam Eid's supporters are being bad Muslims for airing the dispute in public.

Those divisions were in evidence Friday. As Zaidi and others criticized published comments by Imam Eid's supporters, board member Jamina Hassan of Canton and numerous others spoke of the turn of events in anger and disappointment.

As board member Aboubakr preached in the upstairs prayer room about Abraham's faithfulness and why Muslims should ‘‘leave matters to Allah,'' several mosque members stayed outside.

‘‘I'm not going to pray behind this guy,'' one longtime member said, referring to Aboubakr. . .

Read the entire story here. Gone are the days in the aftermath of 9-11 when a clueless Bush administration was inviting CAIR and their ilk to the White House. It sounds like this appointment of Imam Eid is a good step. Unfortunately, the above article is also a textbook example of the method by which mosques in America have been being taken over for years by radical elements.

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Jasser On Lessons From The Arrest of the Ft. Dix Six

M. Zuhdi Jasser, a former Naval Officer and the President of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, weighs in on the messages that should be coming out of the recent arrest of six Islamists who planned to conduct a terror attack on Ft. Dix:

1) While most Muslims have never met militants like those arrested, Muslim organizations should understand that only Muslims hold the keys to the way to overwhelm and counter the ideology which fuels these radicals. Muslim organizations should be clamoring to expose and infiltrate the ideology and sources which drove these traitors to sprout their radical cell. We need an Islamic vaccine (the separation of spiritual Islam from political Islam) to the virus which afflicted these men. Until Muslim anti-Islamists can defeat Islamism (political Islam) as an ideology, we will not make any headway at preventing the germination of the next cell. We will only be left waiting, praying, for the FBI to help us, yet again, dodge the next bullet.

2) Will the FBI’s success here answer the question as to why we need to protect each and every citizen in America who practices the principle of “see something, say something” as the heroic video-store clerk (“John Doe”) did here? What if this “John Doe” had contrarily chosen to be silent due to a fear of litigation?

3) Will we continue to deny the fact that America is not exactly that far behind Europe in our susceptibility to homegrown terror cells?

Read the entire story here. Now compare his approach to the arrest of the Ft. Dix Six with CAIR's request to the nation's news organizations not to mention that the six arrested were motivated by Islam to conduct their terror attacks.

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Tony Blair & Islam: Is He A Cynic Or A Fool?

Tony Blair's legacy as Prime Minister is positive, I think, though much awaits the passage of time and the judgment of history. From this side of the pond, looking solely at his relationship with the United States, I could not have more respect for the man. But all of that is for another post. This post concerns Blair's plans for after he leaves the post of Prime Minister. And either Blair is about to execute an incredibly cynical plan to cash in on the Saudi petrodollars or he is a truly dangerous fool. See this:

BRITISH Prime Minister Tony Blair intends to create a global foundation to foster "greater understanding" between the three "Abrahamic faiths" of Christianity, Judaism and Islam after he leaves Downing Street.

Mr Blair, who will announce his timetable for resignation today, is expected to make the project the main focus of his energies when he leaves office this northern summer.

A member of his tight-knit inner-circle of advisers confirmed yesterday that Mr Blair is looking to "set up some sort of interfaith organisation", saying: "He sees this as where the action is and nobody else is really doing it."

. . . [T]he interfaith project will attempt to foster religious - rather than political - harmony in the Middle East and elsewhere across the world, including Britain, where rising tensions with militant Islam have provided the backdrop to many of the worst moments of his 10 years in office.

Mr Blair, who was enthusiastically reading the Koran even before the September 11, 2001, attacks on the US, said recently: "The tragedy is that as Christians, Jews and Muslims we are all Abrahamic religions. We regard ourselves as children of Abraham but we have fought for so long."

In a speech in 2006 he referred to a woman protesting about the Pope's recent visit to Turkey holding a poster which stated that "Jesus was a prophet but not the son of God". This, he said, was "elevating the placard to an altogether higher plane of theology".

He added: "Most Christians are hugely surprised to be told that the Koran reveres Jesus as a prophet. Many Jews, Muslims and Christians are entirely ignorant of the rich Abrahamic heritage we share in common."

Although aides acknowledge that the new project may face resistance from Muslims who loathe him for his role as an ally to Mr Bush and in the invasion of Iraq, Mr Blair believes that he can appeal to moderate Islam.

. . . Funding for the new organisation is expected to come from wealthy donors in the US and the Arab world, as well as Britain. But advisers insist that preparations are still at an early stage. . . .

Read the entire story here.

The absolute last thing we need is another major organization providing cover for Islam - and this has all the sounds of doing precisely that. What we do need is an international organization that will bring Wahhabi / Salafi Islam into the light of reality and subject it to reasoned criticism. I can assure you, however, funding for such an organization is not going to be forthcoming from wealthy Arab donors in the Middle East. The wealthy Arabs are the Saudis who spend their petrobillions spreading Wahhabi / Salafi Islam. If Mr. Blair will be receiving funding from wealthy Arabs, he will be pocketing money to be nothing more then a useful idiot for the Wahhabis, and a source of suicidal ignorace for the rest of Western civilization.

In the article, Mr. Blair asserts that Islam's classification as an Abrahamic religion is somehow relevant to Western understanding of Islam. That is something that I would expect to see written by a Wahabbi front organizations, such as CAIR in America or the MCB in the UK. Yes, the Koran has some references to Jesus. That is utterly meaningless in the scheme of things. It is like saying that blueberries and daphne berries are similar on the ground that both are berries. True enough, but the daphne berries will kill you if you eat them. If Mr. Blair intends to paint a picture of Islam based on points such as this, he will be doing nothing but contributing to the demise of Western Civilization while cashing in on riyals.

We in the West do not need someone feeding us any more unrealistic pictures that purport to show how peaceful Islam is and how much it is like Christianity. To the extent there are any parallels between Christianity and Wahhabi Salafi Islam, those parallels are limited to the form of Christianity that existed at the turn of the previous millenium. Wahhabi / Salafi Islam, which is rapidly becoming the dominant sect throughtout the Islamic world, is an incredibly racist, triumphalist and brutal religion that clearly has no respect for Judaism or Christianity. Will Mr. Blair be teaching that, as Christians, the Wahhabi's view us as polytheists, and in their school text books, they teach that it is appropriate to kill or enslave such people and take their property? How's that for a bit of reality. It certainly tells you more about Wahhabi Islam then does the point about Islam being an Abrihamic religion. And the BBC documentary Undercover Mosque teaches a lot more also.

If Mr. Blair actually wishes to do something of benefit to the world at large, for those of us in the West, he would develop a foundation dedicated to exposing Wahhabi Islam in all of its ugly reality. And as to the Islamic world, he would use the foundation to support the work of people like Tawfiq Hamid who are highly critical of Wahhabi / Salafi Islam and wish to see it moderate through the process of itjihad.

From the sounds of it, I don't think that I'll hold my breath for that type of foundaton from Mr. Blair. So the only question now, is Blair just a usefull idiot for the radical islamists, or is he greedy cynic with riyals in his eyes?

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The Ft. Dix Six - Do You CAIR About Terrorism?

The news of the six radical Islamists who planned a murderous raid on Fort Dix has been well publicized. See here. The six planned "to kill and die 'in the name of Allah.'" We got lucky on this one. The group was discovered when they asked a store clerk to copy to DVD a tape showing them praising jihad and shooting weapons.

There are many things that are troubling about this bit of planned mayhem, but on the national scale, the one that takes the cake is this, from CAIR, the Council on American Islamic Relations, in their response to the news about the arrests:

CAIR also requested that media outlets and public officials refrain from linking this case to the faith of Islam.

Let that sink in. CAIR is asking the people of the United States to suspend reality and pretend that Islam, and more particularly the influence of Wahhabi / Salafi Islam, has nothing to do with terrorism. It is outrageous and brazen - but par for the course for CAIR and for a whole host of other Wahhabi / Salafi influenced organizations and people.

It should be self-evident that the quickest way to end up dead is not to understand the nature of your enemy. Indeed, Walid Phares, in his book Future Jihad, blamed the inability of the U.S. and its citizens to identify the real threats of Islamic terrorism before 9-11 on the Wahhabi / Salafi influence.

Wahhabi / Salafi Islam comes from Saudi Arabia, and the Sauds have spent many billions to export their religion. They have engaged in a massive funding of schools, clerics, Middle East studies programs, mosques and lobbying organizations in the West, of which CAIR is one. The public face of these institutions and the teachings from the academic side have been more then a bit deceptive in an effort to make Wahhabi / Salafi Islam palatable to the West.

For example, prior to 9-11, most college and graduate students were being taught in Saudi supported Middle East programs that jihad referred to an inner struggle. That, my friends, is clear deception, and it has cost a lot of American lives.

And how many of these Saudi funded organizations and individuals have claimed that the Islamists hate America because of our foreign policy? That canard hides completely the reality of what motivates the violent extremists. It suggests that if we just cut off all relations with Israel or do this other thing that Islamists want us to do, then there would be peace. The truth is far different.

Their religion is triumphalist. If you study a little, you will find virtually all Wahhabi Salafi clerics justify their attack on American civilians on a litany of sins going back to the Crusades. You won't hear that from CAIR, but there are tons of speeches, letters and broadcasts of these folks on the internet. You can get it directly from the Wahhabi / Salafi horse's mouth without it going through the CAIR spin machine.

Now, I don't begin to claim that all followers of Wahhabi / Salafi Islam are terrorists. But the flip side is that most Sunni terrorists are in fact Wahhabi / Salafi Islamists. How do we separate those who would kill us from those who would not?

There are clearly a few things that we can and should do. One is encourage the "moderate" Muslims to constructively criticize their religion and to try and bring it out of the 7th century and into the 21st century. Two is to get educated and expose Wahhabi / Salafi deceptions wherever we find them. The third thing we must do is to stay vigilant and suspicious. That is true whether your a 7-11 store clerk in New Jersey, or your in a group of people on a plane in Minneapolis.

Between their violent criticism of moderate Muslims, their support for legislation to tie the hands of law enforcement in investigating Muslims, and their constant stream of deceptions, CAIR stands directly opposed to all of these things. There can be no clearer example then their statement in light of the arrest of the Ft. Dix six. CAIR takes no responsibility for their religion giving rise to murder and mayhem. To the contrary, CAIR asks America to pretend its not true.

CAIR wants to make America and the West safe for Wahhabi / Salafi Islam to percolate and grow - much like a cancer. We let them succeed only at peril to our lives and our Western values. And the first step to stopping the threat is to acknowledge that the Fort Dix Six were motivated by Islam to commit murder.

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Judicial Watch Issues Latest Report on Radical Islamic Charities in the U.S.

Judicial Watch has issued its latest report on radical islamic organizations operating inside the United States. It's an exceptional read that covers the rouge's gallery of usual suspects - CAIR, MAS, ICNA, etc. - as well as some of which I was unaware.

For example, the report covers the North American Islamic Trust - a Wahhabi Salafi organization that apparently owns between 50% and 80% of all mosques in North America:

The North American Islamic Trust: Shadow Profile

• Newsweek stated, “…authorities say NAIT has long been a funnel for Saudi and other gulf money seeking to spread an often anti-American brand of Islamic fundamentalism in American mosques from southern California to South
Carolina…”

• According to terrorism expert, J. Michael Waller, the organization . . . was raided in 2002 by the U.S. Treasury’s “Operation Green Quest” for suspected involvement with terrorist financing.

• Sami Al-Arian former University of Florida professor and key figure in North American Islamic Trust was sentenced to four years in prison after being convicted of financially and verbally supporting Jihad by donating money to terrorist groups.

What the North American Islamic Trust is Saying and Doing

• The North American Islamic Trust owns the Islamic Academy of Florida – “a criminal enterprise” as described in the federal indictment handed down in February of this year against the school's founder, Sami al-Arian and others alleged to be
Hamas fundraisers.

• In 2003, the group received a $325,000 investment from the Muslim extremist front group, the Council for American Islamic Relations. . . .

Find the report here. And here is an article that addresses reaction to the report by some of the organizations named therein.

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PBS - Refusing to Show the Threat of Islamists in Our Midst

PBS received 20 million dollars in federal funds to develop shows that “enhance public understanding of terrorism, homeland security and other crucial issues in the post-9/11 era.” PBS conceived of a series of 21 documentaries for its Cross-roads series that will begin airing this Sunday. Originally, PBS agreed that one of the segments was to be Islam vs. Islamists – a study of Islam in the west and how moderate voices are under attack from the fundamentalist Muslims also living in the West. That sounds critically important – and something that your average Salafi Wahhabi organization would not like to see at all. Well, the Salafis win. As the Arizona Republic explains:

The segment was titled, Islam vs. Islamists: Voices from the Muslim Center. By and large, the clashes it depicted involved people like Jasser condemning violence perpetrated in the name of Islam, and fundamentalist imams condemning the Jassers of the world as false Muslims.

In some cases, the documentary showed fundamentalists talking candidly about shutting up the moderates in their midst. And, in one case involving a moderate Muslim politician in Denmark, it caught them talking about shutting him up permanently.

In many respects it is an inspiring story, the sort of story that public television often likes to tell.

Unfortunately, we won’t get to see it. PBS has decided to drop that documentary from its play list after, among other things, letting a Muslim professor at DePaul University and an officer in the Nation of Islam screened it first. Apparently, they did not care for it. As the Arizona Republic explains:

Jeff Bieber, WETA's executive producer for Crossroads . . . said Burke's film had "serious structural problems (and) . . . was irresponsible because the writing was alarmist, and it wasn't fair."

. . . Subtitled Voices From the Muslim Center, Burke says his film "attempts to answer the question: 'Where are the moderate Muslims?' The answer is, 'Wherever they are, they are reviled and sometimes attacked' " by extremists.

Michael Levy, a spokesman for CPB, said the corporation set up the Crossroads project and provided funding, but turned over management and content control to PBS and WETA 13 months ago.

After that, Burke says in his Feb. 23 complaint letter, he "consistently encountered actions by the PBS series producers that violate the basic tenets of journalism in America."

. . . Burke . . . says that funding was delayed and WETA began to interfere with his film until it was "expelled" from Crossroads.

Among Burke's examples of tampering:

• A WETA manager pressed to eliminate a key perspective of the film: The claim that Muslim radicals are pushing to establish "parallel societies" in America and Europe governed by Shariah law rather than sectarian courts.

• After grants were issued, Crossroads managers commissioned a new film that overlapped with Islam vs. Islamists and competed for the same interview subjects.

• WETA appointed an advisory board that includes Aminah Beverly McCloud, director of World Islamic Studies at DePaul University. In an "unparalleled breach of ethics," Burke says, McCloud took rough-cut segments of the film and showed them to Nation of Islam officials, who are a subject of the documentary. They threatened to sue.

"This utterly undermines any journalistic independence," Burke wrote in an e-mail to WETA officials.

In an interview, McCloud said she showed a single video frame to a Muslim journalist who was not a Nation of Islam representative.

However, in a January e-mail, McCloud told Crossroads producers that she had spoken with Nation of Islam representatives and "invited them over to view this section." She also wrote that they were outraged "and will promptly pursue litigation."

Read the story here. And in an opinion piece from the same paper:

If Dr. Zuhdi Jasser of Phoenix were a Christian - and he emphatically is not - we might deem him a saint.

But Jasser is a Muslim. He believes in his religion as fervently as any Catholic bishop believes in his. Or any Muslim imam, for that matter. He is faithful to the Quran, which Jasser believes conveys a message of peace.

Because of his faith, and because of what he has done to act on his faith, Jasser has evolved into an extraordinary symbol of what true heroism means in the post-Sept. 11 world. He is a Muslim and an American. And he is a man of peace - a rare, bold iconoclast who is willing to speak out against people who, he believes, have stolen his faith for evil ends.

So, is Zuhdi Jasser what you might call a "moderate" Muslim? If you do, then the Public Broadcasting Service has a problem with you.

. . . They could not bring themselves to declare people like Jasser "moderate" because that would mean criticizing the fundamentalists whom the Jassers of the world oppose.

As the PBS producers affirmed time and again in their letters and e-mails, who is an Islamic "extremist" and who is a "moderate" depends entirely on which side of the street you're standing. In large part, it is about "context."

"We felt the program was flawed by incomplete storytelling and problems with fairness," said Jeff Bieber, executive producer of the Crossroads series. "We felt the writing was alarmist and without adequate context.

"We just felt there was incomplete context, (that) could lead viewers to the wrong conclusions."

"These are the 'root-cause' people," responded Jasser, who said the PBS-WETA producers could not bring themselves to identify the issue facing the United States since Sept. 11, 2001: "It is a radical Islam problem."

This certainly sounds like the PBS deck was stacked against this documentary. I do not know but I bet if we check, we will find that DePaul's Islamic program, like most major colleges in the US, is funded in large part by grants coming out of Saudi Arabia. At any rate, Islam vs. Islamism certainly sounds like it deserves to be aired. Okay, everyone knows what has to be done now, right?

Your Senators

Your Congressman

Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CBP)

CBP Inspector General

PBS

PBS Ombudsman

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The Creep of Wahhabi / Salafi Islam

If you wish your children and grandchildren to grow up in an America like the one you know today, where there is freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and security from coercion in either, then it is incumbent upon every American to take a stand and speak out against Wahhabi / Salafi Islam and its encroachments aimed at working fundemental changes to American values and society. If you do not believe me, at least believe the Salafist and former terrorist Twafik Hamid.

And believe the Gates of Vienna who are tracking meetings being held by the Department of Justice in their First Freedom Project - essentially a series of community meetings involving the DOJ and concerned "citizens." What is happening is that the Wahhabi and Salafi groups - CAIR, MPAC, MAS, and ISNA - who have very specific agendas are attending these meetings to further their goals. Their aim is to pressure the government to change the laws of America to insulate their now dominant sect of Islam from criticism, and to grant them what amounts to protected legal status. If this happens - if say the End Racial Profiling Act passes through Congress, ladies and gentlemen, we are all in deep trouble.

The link to Gates of Vienna above contains a thorough explanation and a report on the last First Freedom Project Meeting by Paul Green. Please, by all means read it - and take appropriate action as outlined therein.

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Deconstructing a Radical Wahhabi Islamist

On March 20, 2007. Sheik Omar Bakir (hereinafter ‘SOB”), a guest of Her Majesty for 20 years until his recent expulsion (still under appeal) and Egyptian Islamist Sheikh Gamal Al-Bana appeared with others on New TV – a station in the Middle East, to discuss “Jihad.” Memri.org has posted a video clip and a transcript. It is revealing when deconstructed to see how Wahhabi jihadists twist history and alter religious terms, redefining them beyond any reasonable bounds to justify their actions.

Deconstructing SOB and friends short talk leads to several conclusions about the radical Wahhabi Islamist philosophy:

1. Under the concept of defensive jihad, every Muslim must take up the sword and seek to kill their enemies.

2. The Wahhabi Islamists define Europeans and Americans as their enemies in the context of defensive jihad on a theory of guilt for a long litany of sins, many of which will not disappear even if all Europeans and Americans withdrew from the Middle East tommorow. The radical Wahhabi Islamists will still argue that the imperative of defensive jihad justifies any act of violence against non-muslim taken anywhere in the world.

3. Wahhabi radical Islamists justify their actions by turning the ambiguity in their religious texts into black and white definitions far removed from any reasonable interpretation of the original words. By so doing, they change what on its face would appear to be clear moral limits, and alter them to the point where radical Islamists see no limit upon their savagery, no act too base, no target out of bounds.

4. The same ambiguity that Wahhabi radical Islamists twist to justify their ends is what will allow Islam to moderate and modernize if given an opportunity. See here. Unfortunately, the radical Wahhabists have a head start, the willingness to use force against all who disagree with them, and the backing of the billions of petrodollars that flow into Saudi Arabia and the Middle East.

The Transcript:

Interviewer: "In an interview with [the London daily] Al-Sharq Al-Awsat on October 10, 2005, you described the people who carried out the 9/11 operation as 'magnificent.' You said that Sheikh Osama bin Laden revived the neglected duty of jihad, and that Allah will reward him for this."

SOB: "Yes. The duty of jihad - and in this case, I'm referring to defensive jihad - had been neglected by the Islamic nation for a long time, because of the arrogance and injustice or America and its allies against the Islamic nation, and because of their support of Israel, and what we see now in the region is the best proof of this. The 9/11 operations were a response to great acts of aggression by America - its attacks on Afghanistan, on Iraq, on Sudan, not to mention the historic Crusades from long ago, and so on."

Deconstruction:

1. Defensive jihad is the duty of every Muslim to fight against any who have invaded or taken what was, at any time, land belonging to Muslims – which would include most of Spain, a part of France, and other parts of Europe. Within the world view of radical Muslims, Islam’s conquests by the sword were not imperialism, rather the conquests were merely advancing the Muslim faith as ordained by Allah. Whereas, any attempt to fight back against Islam and to retake lands lost to the Muslim conquest – which when you get right down to it includes the entire Muslim world outside of Saudi Arabia – is aggression and imperialism by the West. The clear hypocrisy of this position goes over the head of all jihadists. Allah Akbar.

2. SOB actually extends the concept of defensive jihad beyond responding to a loss of territory, but to revenge attacks for past acts of “aggression.” Under this definition of defensive jihad, attacks against non-Muslim Europeans and Americans are a duty of all Muslims anywhere and everywhere across the globe.

3. Just how stupid an SOB is SOB?. America is responsible for the Crusades? Can he possibly mean the Crusades that happened several centuries before America was discovered by Columbus? Actually, he does. This is a common refrain among the jihadists. Apparently, if you are occidental and not a Muslim, then you are a Crusader. What SOB and all other radical Islamists fail to mention is that the Crusades were a response to both several hundred years of Muslim conquest and to the Muslim destruction of the holiest place in Christendom, the Church of the Holy Sephelcure in Jerusalem – the sight of the crucifixion of Jesus. The Church had been built in about 400 A.D. Jerusalem was later invaded and occupied by Muslims and, at the order of Egyptian Caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah, the original Church was completely destroyed in 1009.

4. More SOB dissembling – that 9-11 was justified by American aggression in “Afghanistan, Iraq,” and “so on?” We did not set foot in Afghanistan until after 9-11. Prior to 9-11, we beat back aggression by a secular Iraq in ’91 to save Muslim Kuwait. Hmmm, guess that aggression falls under the “no good deed goes unpunished category.” Aggression in the Sudan? I guess that was the cruise missile President Clinton tossed towards a suspect chemical weapons plant in 1999 in order to take America’s collective attention off illicit Presidential blow jobs – or, as known ever since, “gettin’ a Lewinski.” Hooah. And I guess the “so on” can only refer to America’s war in the early 1800’s against the Muslim Barbary pirates who were raiding American ships. Can you believe our temerity to defend against Islamic . . . aggression is not the right jihaddi word here – let’s call it reasonable Islamic protection from Christian encroachment in Mediterranean sea lanes. I guess the problem with that “great act of aggression” was that Stephen Decatur effectively paddled the Muslim pirates.

5. The bottom line, to radical Islamists, the West is stained with original sin and no further justification is needed to invoke defensive jihad – the duty of all Muslims to take up the sword and attack. We could pack up and leave the Middle East lock, stock and barrel tomorrow, it would make no difference to the radical Wahhabi Islamists.

The Transcript (continued)

SOB: [The 9-11 murderers] "were magnificent, even though they were terrorists. The fact that they carried out a terrorist act does not prevent us from calling them 'magnificent,' because this is what religious scholars call 'commendable terrorism.'"

Interviewer: "You are saying that they waged jihad."

SOB: "That's because we have two kinds of terrorism - commendable terrorism and reprehensible terrorism. Reprehensible terrorism is an attack on women, children, the peaceful, and the innocent."

Interviewer: "So how do you explain the 9/11 operations, in which innocent people were killed, while a Koranic verse says: 'Whoever slays a soul, it is as though he slew all men.'"

SOB: "Yes, but that verse refers to killing in general. 'Do not kill the soul which Allah has forbidden, except when required by justice.' In other words, a Muslim carry out certain religious duties, so when he attacks the enemy attacked on its own land, some innocent people might consequently die, but they are not killed intentionally. This happened in the Bani Al-Nazir raid, and in many other raids in the days of the Prophet Muhammad. When they violated the agreement with him, the Prophet said: 'We conspired against them, and harmed their women and children.' . . . "Killing innocent people is forbidden in Islam. But who is innocent - that is another question."
Interviewer: "There were women, children, and people who had nothing to do with it. They had nothing to do with the U.S. policies."

Sheikh Omar Bakri: "In any war, women and children might be killed unintentionally."

Gamal Al-Bana: "Martyrdom operations in Palestine, in particular, are justified, for two reasons. First, the Palestinians do not have weapons to defend themselves. They have no tanks, artillery, and so on. This is the only means available to them. Therefore, it is justified, especially since it is the Israeli soldiers that are targeted. When I say 'soldiers' - the entire Israeli people is recruited. The women are the most vicious of them all. Therefore, this is justified. I consider this to be martyrdom. Even if they harm a woman - all the women serve in the army. All the men serve in the army. Only the small children remain, and the fact is that these are only very rarely harmed. I believe that these are martyrdom operations, and are necessary."

Deconstruction (continued)

1. This is fascinating. Even an unadulterated radical Islamist like SOB can recognize that the acts of 9-11 constituted terrorism – i.e., violent acts aimed at coercing the civilian population and the government to achieve a political goal. Seems self-evident, does it not? Why is that important? Because the Islamic countries at the UN refuse to agree to a UN definition of terrorism. They do not want to be criticized for their support of - nor their commission of – terrorism against Israelis in particular, whenever and wherever it can be accomplished. Slaughtering Jews is apparently “commendable terrorism,” but then again so is murdering the citizen of any non-Islamic state, such as the US. Note that the statement of Al-Bana states this even more clearly.

2. “Commendable terrorism” and ‘”reprehensible terrorism?” I guess the dividing line is all in the eye of the radical Wahhabi Islamist beholder.

3. I have previously posited that Islam does have the capacity to moderate. What we see here is how a radical Islamist fills in the gray of the Koran with the black and white of the Wahhabi. “. 'Do not kill the soul which Allah has forbidden, except when required by justice.” To the Wahhabi triumphalist interpreting that passage, the term “justice” has one definition - justice means that the Islam must be spread by any and all means. Obviously, there can be more then one interpretation of “justice.” But it will only be accepted in the Muslim world as possible if we fight against Wahhabi Islam as hard as they are fighting against us. Unfortunately, the Wahhabis have a significant head start – and the backing of billions of Saudi petrodollars.

4. Killing innocent people is forbidden in Islam, but who is innocent - that is another question." Here the Wahhabis have twisted the word “innocent” until it has no practical meaning. If you are a non-Muslim, you are not an innocent. If I recall correctly, bin Laden justified the wholesale slaughter of 9-11 by reasoning that the people killed paid taxes the government and voted for the government, and thus were complicit in the sins of the nation state. SOB is doing the same. Again, this is a replay of what I wrote in paragraph 3, above.

5. You got to love al-Bana’s statements. “The Palestinians do not have weapons to defend themselves . . .” You could have fooled me. Actually, it seems like, between small arms, RPG’s and Katusha rockets, Gaza is, per square mile, one of the more militarized places on the face of this earth. And then there is more of the same Wahhabi logic. There are no innocent Israelis. All Israelis are subject to military induction and therefore every Israeli citizen is a legitimate target. This is also why you will never here Wahhabi organizations, such as CAIR, which purports to decry violence against innocents, ever actually name a Hamas or similar organization in their pronouncements against terrorism. The average Westerner cannot begin to fathom how these Wahhabists define their terms, and that what allows CAIR and similar organization to present a facade of reasonableness. Bottom line, unless you get an unambiguous statement from a Wahhabi Islamist, don’t believe it. And even then . . .

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The Lighter Side of Wahhabi Islam

Somehow I doubt that Harry Potter books top the charts in Saudi Arabia. Not that there are that many books allowed in Saudi Arabia anyway. At any rate the Arab News is carrying an extensive article on the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice, the morals police of Saudi Arabia. The article includes an interview with Wahhabi / Salafi Commission President Sheikh Ibrahim Al-Ghaith, (and unless my language skills have failed me, I do believe that is Arabic for "Voldemort").

Q: What is the commission doing to catch sorcerers in Saudi cities. And what is their fate after they are caught? Could you tell us how many of them were caught this year and their locations? And what about the magic spells that are thrown into the Red Sea? How are these spells broken?

A: The commission plays a large role in capturing people who practice sorcery or delusions since these are vices which affect the faith of Muslims and cause harm to both nationals and expatriates. The commission has assigned centers in every city and town to be on the lookout for these men. As for their fate, they are arrested and then transferred to concerned authorities. The commission also has a role in breaking magic spells, which are found in the sea. We cooperate with divers in this aspect. After the spells are found, they are then broken using recitations of the Holy Qur’an. We do not use magic to break magic spells, as this is against the teachings of Islam as mentioned by the Supreme Ulema. But we use the Qur’an as did the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him).

Read the entire article here. I wonder why CAIR, in its description of the joys of Wahhabi Islam, does not publicize things such as this. And evidently, beyond witchcraft, the morals police of Saudia Arabia also closely inspect the critically important restaurant seating arrangements for possible nefarious practices that would sap the ability of any Saudi male to exercise self-restraint.

Q: What is your position on families going out together?

A: We always request restaurants and recreation area managers that they have separate areas for men and women, or separate areas for women and their children and other separate areas for men alone. Or that a place be designed where a family, women members and male members who are mahrams (brothers, sons, uncles) can sit alone. As for different families sitting together with mixed men and women, who are non-mahrams, then this is the basis of corruption.

But so much for the lighter side of Saudi Arabia's Wahhabi Islam. On a more serious note, a 20 year old woman was sentenced to 6 months imprisonment and 60 lashes for running away from home. The sentence was apparently based on the fact that she was caught outside of her home without a male family member escourting her. Read the story here. But in a world where all things are relative, the inequity of this story pales in comparison to this one, a post where you will also get a description of a Saudi judicial flogging.

At any rate, how about that religion of peace? I think CAIR and MAS could use a little more truth in advertising myself.

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MAS, CAIR & Minnesota - the Epicenter of Radical Islamic Activism?

Compliments of Powerline, this is from the Wall Street Journal looking at the unusual confluence of Islamic activisim in Minnesota:

What's going on? It appears that both local circumstances and activists with a big-picture agenda play a role. Take the taxi drivers. Minnesota is home to tens of thousands of Somalis, most recent immigrants. Behind the scenes, moderate local Somali leaders are engaged in a power struggle with national Muslim organizations that seek to exploit this vulnerable population. Islam prohibits the consumption of alcohol but not its transportation, say Somalis who reject the taxi drivers' stance. Yet in June 2006, the Muslim American Society's (MAS) Minnesota chapter issued a "fatwa" forbidding drivers here from carrying alcohol to avoid "cooperating in sin."

Hassan Mohamud, one of the fatwa signers, praised the two top-light proposal as a national model for accommodating Islam in areas ranging from housing to the workplace. But according to Omar Jamal of the Somali Justice Advocacy Center in St. Paul, MAS is "trying to hijack and radicalize the Somali community for their Middle East agenda."

Ahmed Samatar, a recognized expert on Somali society at Macalester College in St. Paul notes that "There is a general Islamic prohibition against drinking, but carrying alcohol for people in commercial enterprise has never been forbidden." Similarly, Islam prohibits consuming pork, but not touching or scanning it, according to Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf of the American Society for Muslim Advancement in New York. It is, or should be, "a nonissue."

In Washington, the Democratic leadership is likely to seek passage of the End Racial Profiling Act, of which House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called herself, in 2004, a "proud" cosponsor. Both MAS and CAIR are stumping for the bill, which would bar airport security personnel from disproportionately questioning Muslims or people of Middle Eastern descent. Minnesota's Keith Ellison, the nation's first Muslim Congressman, told me that the imams' situation reflects a misunderstanding of Muslim prayer and will be sorted out in court, while the other matters stem from the normal process of immigrant adjustment.

The events here suggest a larger strategy: By piggy-backing on our civil rights laws, Islamist activists aim to equate airport security with racial bigotry and to move slowly toward a two-tier legal system. Intimidation is a crucial tool. The "flying imams" lawsuit ups the ante by indicating that passengers who alerted airport authorities will be included as defendants. Activists are also perfecting their skills at manipulating the media. After a "pray-in" at Reagan National Airport in Washington, D.C., one credulous MSNBC anchor likened the flying imams to civil rights icon Rosa Parks.

The comparison is misplaced: Omar Shahin, leader of the detained imams, has helped raise money for at least two charities later shut down for supporting terrorism. From 2000 to 2003, he headed the Islamic Center of Tucson, which terrorism expert Rita Katz described in the Washington Post as holding "basically the first cell of al Qaeda in the United States." CAIR has long been controversial for alleged terrorist ties, while the Chicago Tribune has described MAS as the American arm of the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood, which "preaches that religion and politics cannot be separated and that governments eventually should be Islamic."

For background on the Muslim Brotherhood and its arm in America, the Muslim American Society, please see here, here, here and here. They need to be watched and challenged every bit as much as CAIR. You might want to also check out their website here.

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Let The CAIR-Flying Imam P.R. Campaign Begin

CAIR’s national legal director, Arsalan Iftikhar, is busy writing opinion pieces about the Flying Imams and racial profiling from the radical Wahhabists point of view, and at least one "useful idiot" newspaper has seen fit to give him a podium.

Many watching the Flying Imams case strongly suspect that this whole farce was stage managed by CAIR to provide grist to justify the passage of a truly atrocious piece of legislation that CAIR has been promoting for years – The End Racial Profiling Act. Iftikhar’s opinion piece does nothing to dispel that belief. The entire piece is devoted to playing up the Flying Imams and discussing how evil law enforcement are engaging in unlawful racial profiling against muslims in the wake of 9-11.

You have to love this guy’s arguments. One, all of the evidence about what the Flying Imams did to get tossed from the plane are all lies. As Iftikhar puts it:

. . . [F]alse media reports after the incident stated some of the following false claims: The imams were praying inside the plane, they were chanting pro-Saddam statements, and other silly accusations.

Lies- all lies I say. Hmmm, you can review the lies here and decide for yourself.

Two, paying attention to Muslims acting strange on a flight has no reasonable basis:

. . . The case of the imams’ ejection from an airliner highlights the growing politics of fear and how this hysteria is manifesting itself in our American social fabric.

Its that damned Islamaphobia again. We should be paying attention to fundamentalist Christians and those radical Jews. Let's leave the peace loving Wahhabists alone. By the way, to see Wahhabi Islam in its true form, check out here.

This is nothing more then CAIR trying to change the fabric of America to make it safe for Wahhabi Islam. The remainder of Iftikhar’s arguments go to the evils of racial profiling and playing up the End Racial Profiling Act.

Just so you know, the End Racial Profiling Act would drastically change how our law enforcement would do its work. It would let Muslims sue individual security personnel for racial profiling based on a pure numbers game. If, out of every 100 people searched by a guard, four are Muslim, that guard is deemed to have committed unlawful racial profiling if the population density of Muslims in the local area is less then 4 per 100. The burden of proof shifts to the guard to prove that he did not racially profile. And who could not imagine that the day after this legislation is enacted, CAIR starts filing class action suits against the FBI, etc. If this ever gets put into law, America as a nation can hang it up.

I truly hope that the Airways – or the John Does sued in the Flying Imam lawsuit – fashion their discovery to expose CAIR’s involvement in stage managing the Flying Imam incident. And that they then sue CAIR for every Wahhabi penny supplied by CAIR’s Saudi benefactors. The bottom line, CAIR needs to watched and challenged at every turn.

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CAIR's Flying Imams - Update 1 - A Muslim Organization Takes A Stand

The American Islamic Forum for Democracy, a group headed by Phoenix physician Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, bills itself as:

a think-tank based in Phoenix, Arizona founded on the compatibility of American Constitutional democracy and our citizenship pledge with our personal and spiritual faith of Islam. Our mission is to separate religion and politics in the practice of Islam.

AIFD has come out strongly against the CAIR managed lawsuit by the Flying Imams and, indeed, is putting their money where their mouth is. Today, AIFD told the Washington Times that their organization will raise the funds to pay for the defense of the individuals named as "John Does" in the lawsuit.

It is good to see a Muslim organization take a stand both against CAIR and against this atrocity of a lawsuit. In truth though, it is likely only to be symbolic - not because of any lack of sincerity on the part of the AIFD, but rather because it appears that lawyers are lining up to offer their services pro bono in defense of this lawsuit.

You can read the whole story here. I think that CAIR has made a real error with this lawsuit. The actions of the Imams were too contrived and pushed too many hot buttons for anyone to believe that this was anything other then a stage managed event. And if CAIR can be shown responsible, it will greatly undermine their organization. Or so I hope, but perhaps I am being overly optimistic.

At any rate, I found this on AFID's website, issued the same day as the law-suit was filed by the Flying Imams. It is well worth a read. AFID, an organization that I was not aware of until today, sounds deserving of our support:

March 13, 2007
AIFD Press Release
PRESS RELEASE

MARCH 13, 2007

NOT ALL MUSLIMS SUPPORT CAIR PLAN TO SUE US AIRWAYS on BEHALF of SIX IMAMS

Muslim organization believes that lawsuit filed by CAIR on behalf of local Phoenix imams is wrong for American Muslims and wrong for America.


[PHOENIX, AZ: March 13, 2007]: Wide media attention is being given today to the lawsuit filed by CAIR on behalf of six imams against U.S. Airways for their claims of discrimination against race and religion. Most of the imams are from local mosques here in Phoenix and were removed from a U.S. Airways flight on November 21, 2006 en route to Phoenix from Minneapolis.

AIFD would like the American public to be aware of our following positions representing an alternative voice from the American Muslim community.

1. We will not accept the victimization agenda of organizations like CAIR. Lawsuits like the one announced today exploit the climate of political correctness and at the end of the day are harmful to the Muslim minority in America.

2. Make no mistake, this type of agenda and policy direction of organizations like CAIR only represents its own membership and its own donors. A relatively small percentage of the 5-6 million American Muslims are enrolled as members of CAIR. Recent considerable donations to CAIR upwards of a combined $100 million from foreign nations like Dubai and Saudi Arabia make these types of costly, distractive actions against domestic airlines such as US Airways very concerning in its manifestation of foreign interference.

3. One of the frontlines in the war on terror is at the airports and at the gates. While the imams were clearly removed for their behavior after entering the plane, it should be made clear that many less rigid but equally pious Muslims believe (including 3 out of 6 of the imams for that matter) that the prayer they performed could have been performed upon landing in Phoenix due to travel dispensations in Islam or privately on time while seated on the flight. Muslims believe that God is forgiving and does not expect religion to be "too difficult".

4. While the six imams' handlers, CAIR, and their lawyers may have some kind of obscure basis for their lawsuit, it is our belief that the fallout and publicity from such litigation is wrong for American Muslims, wrong for American security, and wrong for American freedoms. The greatest guarantor of our rights as American Muslims is the tenor of our relationship with the greater majority of American society. This type of litigiousness is divisive and achieves nothing but resentment and actually causes far more harm than good to the overall image of the Muslim community in the eyes of non-Muslim America.

4. It is our hope as Americans and as Muslims that U.S. Airways stand firm in its defense of its actions to have the gentleman removed for concerns regarding their behavior after entering the plane. This is not about race or religion. It is about the privilege to fly securely.

5. The constant exploitation of America's culture of political correctness especially in this setting of what is the most dangerous environment of air travel is out of touch with America's priorities. Such misguided priorities by Muslim activist organizations like CAIR will make the legitimate defense of our civil rights far more difficult when more serious complaints of racism and discrimination are involved. America is quickly becoming numb to their constant refrains and the polls demonstrate the profound ineffectiveness of their tiring campaigns.

6. The organized Muslim community should instead be working on developing a strategic plan to counter militant Islamism within the Muslim community. That would do a lot more to change public opinion than suing the airlines who are trying to keep Americans who travel safe.

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CONTACT: AIFD Chairman, Board of Directors: M. Zuhdi Jasser. 602-254-1840, info@aifdemocracy.org . Website: www.aifdemocracy.org

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Unable to Keep An Eye On CAIR - Part 6.1

We were unable to keep an eye On CAIR this time because CAIR apparently bears a grudge against any individual or group that has the temerity to do anything other then blindly swallow CAIR’s dubious propoganda. Dinah Lord at Maverick News caught this one.

CAIR was holding their news conference today to announce the Six Flying Imams lawsuit. It was soon clear that CAIR did not want anyone there that might raise uncomfortable questions regarding the veracity of the Six Imams in light of the substantial evidence to the contrary, nor, for at least one of them, questions about his significant ties to organizations shut down in the past few years for their criminal ties to terrorist entities. Apparently, CAIR expected just such questions from CBN, the Christian Broadcasting Network. And thus, the CBN crew were unceremoniously ejected from the premises by Ibrahim Hooper, who added

We have long barred the Christian Broadcasting Network from our news conferences because of their long, long history of vicious, anti-Muslim bigotry. And we have no motivation to promote that kind of intolerance. And it's a private function and we have decided they are not welcome.

If the irony of that statement does not have you rolling on the floor in gales of laughter, you either have no sense of humor or simply are not yet up to snuff on the nature of Wahhabi Islam and the track record of CAIR -- in which case its time to hit the books.

Please read Ms. Lord's entire post here.

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Moderate Islam in America and CAIR's Strategy

This morning, I happened upon a 2002 editorial in the newspaper Pakistan Today. The editorial was written by Tashbih Sayyed, a reporter who had left the Pakistan for the United States as he was coming under increasing pressure to conform his articles to hardline muslim fundementalist mores. Mr. Sayyed addressed in his article what he saw as wrong with Wahhabi / Deobandi Islam, and tells how he had hoped to find a practice of moderate Islam in America, only to find much of the Wahhabi poison already seeping into the fabric of America.

In this 2002 article, Mr. Sayyed forecasts precisely the strategy of the Wahhabists and CAIR that we see being played out today -- to claim leadership of all muslims in America, to silence moderate muslim voices, and to drive a wedge between all Muslims in America and all non-Muslims. This is a very important read, particularly coming on the heels of the the Flying Imams (here and here) and CAIR's attempts to silence and belittle the Secular Islam Summit (here).

It is to help people like this author, Mr. Sayyed, that we need to challenge organizations such as CAIR at every turn. And it is Mr. Sayyed's voice, like the voices of those who participated in the Secular Islam Summit, that we need to amplify until it reaches decibels exponentially above that of CAIR's.

The US, more than any Muslim country, understands the principles Allah values and protects them through the US Constitution. The Constitution proclaims that the US government is a creation "of the people by the people and for the people." Allah's will does not favor a particular faith, color or creed, and neither does the American constitution. Allah advocates the middle road hoping that every person will not only take care of themselves, but will work to make the lives of their community members better as well. American values teach the same, translating the idea of social justice into civil liberties principles like the right to privacy, and education without any prejudice or discrimination. Volunteering and charitable work are respected as well. One only has to demonstrate a will to perform.

Islamists know that if American values are allowed to spread in the Muslim world, it will help the evolution of a Muslim state of mind that believes in democracy, pluralism and social justice. The real Islam which, up until now, has lain imprisoned in books, can finally be set free. The US can help in the establishment of a democratic society in the Muslim world after fifteen hundred years of intellectual despotism.
. . . .
In a polarized American society, it will be easy for the Islamists to achieve their goal. It will create a sense of insecurity among Muslims. To make the Muslims feel insecure in America and to force them to join the radical Islamist groups, a deliberate attempt is being made by Islamists to drive a wedge between Muslims and non Muslims. Innocent incidents are being turned into events that cause non-Muslims to dislike Muslims. The non-Muslims are intentionally made to hate Muslims. Situations are being created under which a non Muslim is made to think that Islam is not a peaceful religion and Muslims are not law abiding citizens.

I urge you to read the entire editorial here (part 1) and here (part 2).

Mr. Sayyad has written numerous editorials for Pakistan Today since the two I have linked here, and all are collected on the newspapers archives. I have not read them all yet, but do intend to do so over the next few days. You can find the archives here.

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Keeping an Eye on CAIR - Part 6: The Flying Imams File

CAIR has held its press conference announcing the filing of the lawsuit by the flying imams. Their press release also has a link to the lawsuit itself. According to the facts therein, the imams were the model of decorum, at no time even discussing religion or politics, and indeed, several of the imams fell asleep upon boarding. Damn, how did it happen that all of the people who gave evidence in the police report to the contrary (see here) conspired to lie against these men just because they were Muslims? Its just rampant Islamaphobia, I guess. We will just have to wait for discovery -- and I do so with baited breath.

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