Government aid for the Muslim Brotherhood View Comments

Christine Brim at Big Peace reveals that the Obama administration is doing still more to assist Islamic organizations in America, including funding them with tax-payers’ money. To what end?

On August 31, this coming Tuesday, the Muslim Brotherhood-associated “Coordinating Council of Muslim Organizations” (CCMO) will bring 25-30 Muslim leaders of 20 national Muslim groups to attend a special workshop presented by the White House and U.S. Government agencies (Agriculture, Education, Homeland Security, Health and Human Services etc.) to provide the groups “funding, government assistance and resources.” The workshop will apparently provide special access for these Muslim Brotherhood organizations: the organizers pledge to provide “direct access” and “cut through red tape.” Government and Muslim groups will hold an Iftar dinner (breaking the fast of Ramadan) after the workshop.

The event was announced in an email newsletter sent August 27 by the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terrorism finance trial, long associated with the Muslim Brotherhood, the global Islamist network.

The Muslim Brotherhood founded in 1928, is a global Islamist political movement dedicated to imposing Shariah law on all nations and institutions. Their credo is “Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. Qur’an is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope.”

While it promotes stealth jihad throughout the Western world, it also uses violent force when and where it can. It is the parent movement of Hamas, the terrorist organization that controls Gaza and wages perpetual war on Israel.

The Hudson Institute quotes the Muslim Brotherhood’s own declaration of its world-wide ambitions:

We have a clear mission—to implement Allah’s law, on the basis of our belief that that it is the real, effective way out of all our problems—domestic or external, political, economic, social or cultural. That is to be achieved by forming the Muslim individual, the Muslim home, the Muslim government, and the state which will lead the Islamic states, reunite the scattered Muslims, restore their glory, retrieve for them their lost lands and stolen homelands, and carry the banner of the call to Allah in order to bless the world with Islam’s teachings.

Christine Brim thinks that the groups attending the “workshop” and dinner are likely to be associated with the Muslim Brotherhood, because -

The sponsoring organization – the Coordinating Council of Muslim Organizations (CCMO), co-sponsoring with the Department of Agriculture – has a long history of associations with the Muslim Brotherhood.

And because the CCMO officers are themselves Muslim Brotherhood leaders:

These are not just your garden-variety Muslim Brotherhood operatives. The CCMO officers include leading national and international figures in the Muslim Brotherhood, settled in the Washington DC suburbs to enjoy “direct access” to the Administration and Congress. CCMO is a major U.S. node in the loosely coordinated Muslim Brotherhood network. Just the fellows to give your tax dollars as stimulus money!

If Christine Brim is right and the organizations being aided by the government are pursuing the aims of the Muslim Brotherhood, this can only mean that the Obama administration is actively helping to promote those aims.

Is it doing so inadvertently, not realizing that these organizations have an anti-American agenda? Christine Brim doesn’t think so:

I suggest that the Administration knows these groups are linked to the Muslim Brotherhood. They think that’s a good thing.

This isn’t incompetence; it’s intentional.

What can be done about it? Any chance the mainstream media will investigate these dark procedures as a start?

Not much of a one, we guess.

Fighting for sharia View Comments

We must remind ourselves: What was the invasion of Iraq for?

We’re not talking about pretexts to urge other states into coalition with US forces, such as the need to eliminate Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction.

And we’re not changing our mind about the invasion: we’re glad that the tyrant was toppled from power and executed.

But wasn’t there a supreme, highly desirable, worth-sacrificing-lives-for, aim of the war?

We seem to remember that it had to do with changing the Ba’athist tyranny into a Western-style democratic state and Western ally.

Somehow, along the way, that aim has been forgotten, changed, or discarded.

Sure, there have been elections in Iraq: people voted, and there is a parliament of representatives. But the rooting of democracy requires much more than that.

For one thing, in our sort of democracy the law treats all sane adults equally.

Islamic law, sharia, forbids equal treatment. It rates  women as “half a man” in matters of testimony and inheritance. Women have no right to keep their children if their husbands divorce them.

Sharia is not merely incompatible with Western liberal-democratic values, it contradicts them.

While US law enshrines the principle of tolerance, sharia enjoins intolerance (glaring example: apostasy from Islam is punishable by death).

US  law forbids cruel punishment, but sharia amputates limbs and executes by stoning.

So why hasn’t the US, having won the war, insisted on a constitution for Iraq that would ensure justice, as Americans understand it, for all Iraqis?

Instead, Iraq has a new constitution that makes sharia the law of the land.

Who wrote it? Who with this single act rendered the war, so costly in blood and treasure, ultimately pointless?

We have wondered who it was, and now we know. We can identify the architect of Iraq’s constitution.

Believe us or believe us not, it is an American orthodox Jew.

His name is Noah Feldman. And he came to the task under the auspices of Elena Kagan.

His Wikipedia entry informs us:

Noah Feldman grew up in Boston, Massachusetts, where he attended the Maimonides School. He graduated from Harvard College in 1992 and earned a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford University, where he earned a D.Phil in Islamic Thought in 1994. Upon his return from Oxford, he received his J.D., in 1997, from Yale Law School, where he was the book review editor of the Yale Law Journal. He later served as a law clerk for Associate Justice David Souter on the U.S. Supreme Court. In 2001, he joined the faculty of New York University Law School, leaving for Harvard in 2007. In 2008, he was appointed the Bemis Professor of International Law.

He was appointed to his professorship of Internationa Law at Harvard by Elena Kagan (sworn in today as Associate Justice on the Supreme Court), who was then Dean of Harvard Law School.

Christine Brim at Big Peace tells the story:

With Kagan’s direction, Harvard’s Islamic Legal Studies Program developed a mission statement dedicated “to promote a deep appreciation of Islamic law as one of the world’s major legal systems.”  …

Her chief staff at the Islamic Legal Studies Program aggressively expanded non-critical studies of Shariah law

When Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal offered … $20 million to the Islamic Legal Studies Program in December 2005 – Kagan accepted it; after all, the Saudi royal family had funded the program since its inception, to establish the moral and legal equivalency between Shariah law and U.S. Constitutional law.  …

Kagan not only promoted the interests of the Saudis at Harvard, she also protected them when she became Solicitor General:

A suit [was] filed by thousands of 9/11 family members that traced funding for the 19 hijackers to certain Saudi royals, along with banks, corporations and Islamic charities. Kagan, as Obama’s Solicitor General, said in her brief “that the princes are immune from petitioners’ claims” and that the families’ claims …  fell “outside the scope” of the legal parameters for suing foreign governments or leaders.

She appointed Noah Feldman because his admiration for sharia chimed with her own:

In December, 2006, Kagan hired Noah Feldman, architect of Iraq’s Constitution requiring Shariah, as a star faculty member at Harvard Law School. On March 16, 2008, Feldman published his controversial article “Why Shariah” in the New York Times Magazine, which promoted “Islamists” – the Muslim Brotherhood – as a progressive democratic party, and promoted Shariah as a model not just for Muslim-majority countries but for all: “In fact, for most of its history, Islamic law offered the most liberal and humane legal principles available anywhere in the world…” The article was adapted from his book The Fall and Rise of the Islamic State, which was published in late March, 2008.

On September 16, 2008, Kagan whole-heartedly endorsed Feldman’s promotion of the Muslim Brotherhood and Shariah by honoring him with the endowed Bemis Chair in International Law. Feldman’s speech on receiving the award was revealing: he advocated for an international, “outward interpretation” of the Constitution that could “require the U.S. to confer rights on citizens of other nations” …

As to the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamist worldwide political organization that Feldman and Kagan support? Their motto is as revealing as Feldman’s speech:

“Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. Qur’an is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope.”

Given that slogan, you could well ask if Feldman really meant the Muslim Brotherhood when he wrote about “Islamists” in the book which Kagan so admired that she gave him an endowed chair. And he anticipated that question; in the second footnote in his book he states, “Throughout this book, when I refer to Islamists or Islamism, I have in mind mainstream Sunni Muslim activists loosely aligned with the ideology of the transnational Muslim Brotherhood (MB)…the Brotherhood broadly embraces electoral politics, but without eschewing the use of violence in some circumstances, notably against those whom it defines as invaders in Iraq and Palestine.” …

There can be little doubt that Elena Kagan was the moving spirit behind the Iraqi constitution that Noah Feldman wrote. Christine Brim gives further evidence:

On May 1, 2007, Kagan initiated a lecture series on Shariah Law, named for Abd al-Razzaq al-Sanhuri, a legal scholar who had drafted constitutions throughout the Middle East between the 1930s and 1960s. There are literally dozens of legal reformers throughout the Muslim world that she could have chosen; but she chose al-Sanhuri.

Sanhuri’s entire career was dedicated to making sure that the civil and criminal legal codes throughout the Middle East were Shariah-compliant. He drafted the laws that ensured Shariah law took precedence over secular laws. As much as any single individual, he was responsible for the legal drafting for the “Constitutionalization” of Shariah in previously secular Muslim-majority nations in the 20th century, in concert with the political pressure for Shariah by the Muslim Brotherhood, and the financial pressure for Shariah by the Saudi Royal Family.

Kagan consistently used her position at Harvard to promote and legitimate the introduction of Shariah provisions into national constitutions, and indeed into Supreme Courts of other nations.

The example given is Pakistan, where her influence is having “dire consequences”. Christine Brim describes them in her article, which needs to be read in full.

It ends with a warning:

Elena Kagan is fifty years old. She could easily serve to the age of eighty or longer. Her confirmation to the Supreme Court will begin a thirty-years legal war to protect the Constitution against Shariah.

What lies behind View Comments

The government of Turkey and its terrorist group IHH, using an assortment of useful Western idiots as cover, planned and carried out the recent incident off the coast of Gaza when Israelis enforcing the blockade of Gaza were attacked and some of the terrorists were killed. President Obama called it a “tragedy”. It was certainly not a tragedy that nine Islamic terrorists were killed; it was a small triumph. But the motivation behind the Turkish plot could be bringing about a tragedy on an immense scale.

Ryan Mauro writes this (in part) about Turkey and its Prime Minister Erdogan:

The most significant outcome of the Mavi Marmara incident is that there can no longer be any doubt that Turkey has joined the anti-Western bloc that includes Hamas, Iran and Syria. The Muslim country was once devotedly secular, an ally of Israel, and remains a member of NATO [scandalously and dangerously - it should have been expelled - JB], but under the direction of Prime Minister Erdogan and the Justice and Development Party (often referred to as the AKP), Turkey has gone in the completely opposite direction with enormous strategic consequences. …

Erdogan … founded the AKP [in 2001], which took a omore moderate line, portraying itself as committed to separation of mosque and state but “faithful governance,” as Dr. Essam El-Erian, the chief of the Muslim Brotherhood’s political bureau, described the AKP’s “moderate Islamist” ideology. There was no anti-Western rhetoric and the party strongly supported membership in the European Union. [Of course they did - they wanted to inject as huge Muslim population into the EU.] The group won a large victory in the 2002 elections, resulting in Erdogan taking the post of Prime Minister.

Dr. El-Erian praised Erdogan’s victory, saying that it was the result of the “exposing of the failure of the secular trend.” El-Erian confirmed that the Muslim Brotherhood had close ties to the AKP, but the West treated Turkey as if nothing had changed. It wasn’t until Turkey steadfastly refused to allow U.S. soldiers to transit their territory to overthrow Saddam Hussein [which was when and why it should have been expelled from NATO.] that the West began questioning the allegiance of Erdogan’s government.

The Erdogan government soon began a concerted effort to fuel anti-Israeli and anti-American sentiment, knowing that such feelings help the AKP politically and hurt its opponents in the secular military that have long ties to the West. The Turkish media consistently reported alleged U.S. atrocities, fanning the already massive anti-war sentiment. The outrageous claims can only be compared to the anti-Israeli propaganda seen in the Arab world and Iran, echoing similar themes such as the use of chemical weapons against civilians and the harvesting of organs from killed Iraqis.

The AKP won an even larger share of the vote in the July 2007 election and had even more dominance over the government. Since then, the ideology of Erdogan has become more apparent as Turkish opinion has become less hostile to anti-Western Islamism. Shortly after the victory, Turkey’s moves towards Iran and other enemies of the West became more visible and aggressive. ..

Erdogan’s government simultaneously became more anti-Israeli, particularly once the Israeli military offensive into Gaza began in response to the rocket attacks of Hamas. …

The Turkish-Syrian alliance began shortly after Erdogan came to power, with Syrian President Bashar Assad visiting Turkey and a free trade agreement being signed.

Turkey has also moved closer to Sudan, refusing to describe the situation in Darfur as a genocide. Erdogan’s government also opposes the International Criminal Court’s indictment of President Omar al-Bashir for human rights violations. His defense of Bashir is that “no Muslim could perpetrate a genocide.”

Now, Turkey is taking center stage in the wake of the Mavi Marmara incident. Turkey is openly considering cutting off all diplomatic ties with Israel and is saying that its warships will escort future convoys to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip. There are reports that Erdogan himself may actually join a convoy. Erdogan now openly says, “I do not think that Hamas is a terrorist organization…”

Today, the government has begun the country’s “largest-ever crackdown” on the military, prosecuting 33 current and former military officers for allegedly planning a coup to overthrow the AKP government in 2003 including the former head of the special forces. Those arrested have been accused of planning to carry out acts of terrorism including the bombing of mosques, which they deny. Given the military’s pride in acting as the guardian of Turkey’s secularism, it isn’t surprising that elements of the military would desire to see the AKP overthrown. …

Erdogan’s defense of the vessel [the Mavi Marmara] owned by the IHH, a Turkish Islamist group tied to Hamas and other terrorist activity, is particularly insightful. Any true opponent of terrorism and radical Islamism would ban the group or at least officially investigate them. In 1997, the Turkish authorities raided the IHH’s office in Istanbul and made numerous arrests. IHH operatives were found with weapons-related materials and the French counterterrorism magistrate said that they were planning on supporting jihadists in Afghanistan, Bosnia and Chechnya. “The essential goal of this Association was to illegally arm its membership for overthrowing democratic, secular, and constitutional order present in Turkey and replacing it with an Islamic state founded on the Shariah,” the French magistrate’s report said.

If the goal of the IHH is to establish Sharia Law in Turkey, and Erdogan’s government is describing them as a “charity,” what does that say about Erdogan’s plans? …

The West’s loss of Turkey has frightening strategic consequences. They are so frightening that the West refused to acknowledge the trend until it became undeniable in recent weeks. …

Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and other countries in the Middle East and North Africa that are hostile to Iran’s ambitions now face an even more threatening bloc that has been enlarged by the defection of Turkey. The temptation for them to surrender the mantle of leadership to the Iranian-Syrian-Turkish bloc in order to save themselves will now reach unprecedented levels, regardless of whether Iran obtains nuclear weapons or not.

To make matters worse, Erdogan’s prestige as the preeminent challenger of Israel will lead to competition with Iran, sparking an escalation where each side tries to establish superior anti-Israeli and anti-Western credentials. Israel is now in its most isolated and dangerous situation since its birth in 1948.

TSA: Terrorist Support Administration View Comments

This news strains belief. But we tell ourselves it shouldn’t really, because, for  all the glaring stupidity of the decisions, they’re perfectly consistent with the policies and sympathies of the Obama administration.

It comes from Creeping Sharia:

TSA tells terrorists where body scanners are, and exempts them.

Terrorists spread the information and discuss …

… ways to evade and beat airport scanners on jihadi forums:

We have that system in place in Algiers…does anyone know if it’s capable of detecting [the flammable gas] butane?”

On another Jihadist site, a visitor questions security involving 3D scanners at British airports asking: “Can I refuse [to pass through] for religious reasons?”

Before long comes this answer: “… advise those who wish to avoid the Heathrow scanners to take the train to Paris… and then board a plane from there.”

The TSA website features a map and lists of locations to help terrorists determine which airports to avoid when planning to smuggle explosives aboard commercial airplanes. There’s also a video on CNN showing just how easy it is to beat TSA’s screenings.

Since terrorism isn’t limited to air travel, the TSA also lists other domestic U.S. locations where the scanning technology is used, primarily court houses and prisons

[There will be] 1,000 machines in the nation’s highest-risk airports by next year. However, body scanner screening is “optional for all passengers,” and this is due to the stealth jihad of Muslim Brotherhood groups in the United States (funded from outside the United States) – and was enacted to exempt the specific religious demographic that prompted the need for such advanced security.

From a May 2009 posting – well before the Christmas plane bombing attempt and faux fatwas to protect Islamic terrorists were issued; from a host of Muslim Brotherhood-linked stealth jihadists including MPAC, the Islamic Shura Council, and the Fiqh Council of North America:

After a series of meetings with interfaith leaders and advocacy organizations, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) this week agreed to make traveler compliance with the highly controversial “full body scanners” optional. [Remember, the TSA is headed by the lady Mark Steyn aptly calls Janet Incompetano.]

The … announcement came after a number of groups expressed concern over privacy and modesty issues, for themselves and their children, related to the advanced image technology machines. [Never mind the safety issues for the rest of us!] The TSA reassured the community representatives (Dr. Muzammil Siddiqi, Chairman Fiqh Council of North America, Shakeel Syed, Executive Director Islamic Shura Council and Aziza Hassan, Director Government Relations of MPAC) in a meeting requested by the Islamic Shura Council to discuss the Islamic perspective on body scanners. …

It all seems too easy. Islamic terrorists have every advantage. They don’t even have to work for information. They are exempt from the security measures in place to thwart and catch them.

To our great detriment View Comments

Great speeches were made at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) this February 2010. We particularly liked John Bolton‘s address, and Dick Cheney’s, and George Will’s [see our post A prescription for pleasure, February 20.]

We questioned the wisdom of conservatives accepting the co-sponsorship of the John Birch Society [More harm than help, February 20.] But that is far less objectionable than the convening of a CPAC panel by terrorist sympathizers.

Pamela Geller of Atlas Shrugged, who convened an anti-terrorist event,  tells what happened in an interview with Jamie Glazov at Front Page:

Geller: Last Friday, Robert Spencer and I hosted a standing-room-only event at CPAC. …

Our conference was designed to speak the truths that others will not speak. First to speak was Wafa Sultan, the ex-Muslim who shot to international fame after she stood up for human rights against Sharia on Al-Jazeera in a debate with an Islamic cleric on a famous viral video, and the author of A God Who Hates. She spoke of Islam’s war against the West. Then Steve Coughlin, the former Pentagon Islamic law specialist who was making his first public appearance after being fired from the Defense Department after pressure from those who didn’t like his truth-of-the-matter stance on jihad. He gave a bit of his controversial presentation to the Pentagon, showing how the Defense Department is ignoring the true nature of the jihad threat, to our great detriment – which is the title of his lengthy thesis on this problem.

Then in the second hour our speakers showed the next phases of the advance of jihad and Sharia. While Coughlin was fired for telling the truth about Islam and jihad, human rights activist Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff is being prosecuted for “hate speech” in Austria for the same truth telling. After her came Anders Gravers of Stop the Islamisation of Europe, who has been physically assaulted for standing up for freedom in Denmark. Then Simon Deng, a former slave in Sudan and a leading human rights activist against jihad and Islamic supremacism, showed what life is like for the subjugated, enslaved Christians of southern Sudan – the fourth phase of Sharia encroachment. Finally, the war hero and Congressional candidate Lt. Colonel Allen West gave a stirring speech calling us all to the defense of freedom.

FP: It’s a great sign that CPAC hosted an event like this, right?

Geller: Well Jamie, it’s not really what happened. The truth of the matter is that our event was at CPAC, but it was an independent event, not a CPAC event. And the truths that our speakers told were not aired at any other event at CPAC.

FP: Ok, just a second, let me get something straight: we are facing a deadly enemy in this current terror war, and that enemy is Islamic jihad — based on Islamic theology. CPAC had how many panels about it?

Geller: One. And it was an exercise in misinformation.

FP: Are you kidding me?

Geller: Not at all. The single panel was:

“You’ve Been Lied To: Why Real Conservatives are Against the War on Terror

Sponsored by Campaign for Liberty

Speakers: Retired U.S. Air Force Lt. Karen Kwiatkowski and Jacob Hornberger, President of FFF [The Future of Freedom Foundation]

The message there was that “real conservatives” don’t support the war on terror because it is a creation of the “Israeli lobby” — which coalesces with the left-wing’s new anti-Semitism against neoconservatives. Karen Kwiatkowski is a darling of both the leftist Huffington Post and the anti-Semitic paleocon site Antiwar.com.

FP: Tell us some more about Kwiatkowski.

Geller: Well, let’s put it this way: in a 2006 article, she described John Bolton as “that blubbering bundle of self-righteousness.” She also wrote:

“Many in America oppose the U.S. knee-jerk, unquestioning support for Israel. Many more worry that the Israeli lobby is unusually influential in Washington, while remaining hidden and unaccountable to average Americans. Still others are alarmed that Israel’s constant war mentality has become our new American model, and that Iraq and our own borders have become our own occupied territories, teeming with terror and constituting a never-ending threat to our lives, prosperity and value system.” …

That panel was, of course, a reflection of Ron Paul’s perspective. There were no counter-jihadists, no Robert Spencer, no Ibn Warraq on any CPAC panel, but they had room for this well-funded “Campaign for Liberty” presentation. …

Nothing was said about the Islamic doctrine that shows that jihadists would be waging war against the U.S. even if we did end all actions in Afghanistan and Iraq. The panel agreed with Obama, that Muslims are angry with us because of our actions, and will stop being angry with us if we change our foreign policy. This view is naïve and reflects ignorance of Islamic doctrine…

FP: This is mind-boggling. This is a conservative conference and one would think conservatives are interested in national security and protecting our liberties and American lives. Why do you think this happened?

Geller: I think CPAC’s agenda in 2010, as well as 2009 and before that, reflects the influence of Grover Norquist, the conservative powerhouse and kingmaker. He is a board member of the ACU [American Conservative Union]. … Norquist and his ally Suhail Khan seem to be in charge at CPAC

FP: Expand a bit on what perspective Norquist represents.

Geller:  Grover Norquist’s troubling ties to Islamic supremacists and jihadists have been known for years. He and his Palestinian wife, Samah Alrayyes … are very active in “Muslim outreach.”

Geller: In December 2003, David Horowitz wrote that Norquist “has formed alliances with prominent Islamic radicals who have ties to the Saudis and to Libya and to Palestine Islamic Jihad, who are now under indictment by U.S. authorities….

Frank Gaffney here in Frontpage [wrote] how Norquist had given Muslims with jihad terror links access to the highest levels of the U.S. government.

Grover Norquist was on the jihad payroll before and after the carnage and death of September 11. Gaffney revealed Norquist’s close ties to Abdurahman Alamoudi, who is now serving twenty-three years in prison for financing jihad activity. In 2000, Alamoudi said at a rally, “I have been labeled by the media in New York to be a supporter of Hamas. Anybody support Hamas here?…Hear that, Bill Clinton? We are all supporters of Hamas. I wished they added that I am also a supporter of Hizballah.” …

Norquist also introduced Nihad Awad, cofounder and executive director of Council on American-Islamic Relations, to President Bush. CAIR is one of the foremost Islamic supremacist hate sponsors in the U.S. Terror expert Steve Emerson wrote that “CAIR, which touts itself as America’s premier Muslim civil rights organization, was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land [Foundation] terror trial.” …

Emerson also reveals that according to the testimony of an FBI agent, “CAIR was listed as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee.” The Palestine Committee is dedicated to jihad for the destruction of Israel

Robert Spencer added this about CAIR: “CAIR operatives have repeatedly refused to denounce Hamas and Hizballah as terrorist groups. Several former CAIR officials have been convicted of various crimes related to jihad terror…”

These are Grover Norquist’s bedfellows. Abusing his power and access, he introduced Islamic supremacists who advocate the overthrow of the government to those who have an oath to protect and defend the Constitution…

Doing it her way View Comments

Janet Napolitano, whom Obama chose for no good reason to be Homeland Security Secretary, has decided that the best way to keep Americans safe is to work closely with the enemy who is trying to kill them and destroy their country. She will  provide organizations linked to the Muslim Brotherhood with security information at regular meetings, and perhaps award them some tax-payer’s money, trusting that this will induce them to – what? Melt under the warmth of her respect, agree to cancel the jihad, and forswear forever the use of terrorism?

From Pajamas Media:

U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and her senior staff privately met in Washington, D.C., to begin a controversial information sharing program with Muslim organizations — including three directly linked with the extremist entity the Muslim Brotherhood. …

Secretary Napolitano spent an hour and a half briefing the organizations, informing them of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) counter-radicalization program and exploring ways to mutually share information. Muslims, Arabs, and Sikhs attended the briefings held on January 27 and 28. The organizations are scheduled to meet regularly with DHS senior aides and with Napolitano.

Publicly, most Muslim and Arab organizations have said they oppose rising militancy and radicalization within their communities. But privately, they seem to harbor distrust of law enforcement agencies and believe profiling, not radicalization, is the primary problem in the United States.

The organizations meeting with Napolitano included the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), an unindicted co-conspirator in a 2007 federal terror funding case. Also present were the leaders of the Muslim Public Affairs Council and the Muslim American Society. All are linked to the Muslim Brotherhood, which is considered the ideological foundation for Islamic terror groups.

Many of the radical groups, including those who have extremist ties, publicly embrace counter-radicalization programs. One of the reasons, congressional sources said, is that there is a possibility the Obama administration may award large government grants to the Muslim groups if they join the new program. Nevertheless, while many Muslim groups have preached moderation and anti-radicalization in public, privately they seemed reluctant to rally to the administration’s side. In some cases there certainly were people expressing in private conversation a sort of outrage that this [counter-radicalization] is even a topic of discussion.

Reactions from anti-terrorist authorities also were negative. Some felt it demonstrated the administration was naïve. U.S. House Rep. Sue Myrick (R-NC), a member of the U.S. House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said that … the administration was clueless: “It is clear government agencies and officials do not get it.”

Steve Emerson, an anti-terrorism expert and the founder of the Investigative Project on Terrorism, told PJM: “I’m not sure she [Napolitano] understands what the Muslim Brotherhood is. It’s the parent of al-Qaeda and all terrorist groups, confirmed by all the intelligence chiefs.”

A former intelligence officer for the U.S. government [said]: “The fact that the government reaches out to these groups, more than any other factor, shows you how broken our intelligence apparatus is.”

Fort Hood: a Muslim objects to the Pentagon’s PC report View Comments

Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser is a former lieutenant commander in the United States Navy where he served as a medical officer. He is the President and Founder of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, a nonprofit charitable organization ‘dedicated to preserving the founding principles of the United States Constitution, liberty and freedom, through the separation of mosque and state’.

Here he makes a sensible – ie non-politically correct – comment on the Fort Hood massacre, and the Pentagon’s report of it:

“On November 5, 2009, the United States Army was viciously attacked from within by an ideologue bent on pursuing an agenda of Islamist extremism. This ideologue fell under the separatist influence of political Islam while serving as an officer. It is incumbent upon our force to begin to understand this theo-political ideology that threatens our soldiers internally and externally.”

These critical lines are completely missing from the Pentagon’s 84-page report reviewing the massacre of 13 U.S. soldiers and contractors at Fort Hood. Yet this is only one of many omissions that the Pentagon should pursue from this incident.

Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan opened fire on Nov. 5 because his adherence to extreme Islamism overrode his allegiance to his country and his sworn oath to protect it against all enemies. … Hasan’s defense is not the job of the Pentagon. The Pentagon has a duty to honestly assess the root of the attack and to ensure that the military is adequately protecting our forces from the threat from within and without.

As a former lieutenant commander in the U.S. Navy, I know the culture of the U.S. military. While I served my 11 years pre-9/11, the culture of political correctness was pervasive. This travesty of a report is front and center evidence of that paralyzing culture.

As a Naval physician and former chief resident at Bethesda Naval Hospital, I can also speak to the inadequacies in the counterterrorism, counter-radicalism and insurgency training of commanders like those being held to blame for Hasan’s promotion and movement up the chain of command… His commanders were seriously concerned about his actions and the role his faith played in his everyday interactions with patients. Had they brought those concerns to his review process, they would have been vilified as Islamaphobes. Even had Hasan’s superiors appropriately identified his behaviors, a military discharge is light years down the path of administrative counseling and punishment he would have received. Which begs the question, would a demoted Hasan have been any less of a threat?

As a Muslim, I am most fearful that our entrenched mindset of victimization and political correctness is precluding a vitally necessary open discussion of faith-based issues both inside and outside of the military. The current military and governmental culture precluded Hasan’s superiors from questioning anything relating to his faith.

At a Jan. 15, 2010, press conference Secretary Robert Gates himself confirmed this state of affairs: “Current policies on prohibited activities provide neither the authority nor the tools for commanders and supervisors to intervene when DOD personnel {are} at risk of personal radicalization.”

Yet the secretary has recommended Secretary of the Army John McHugh “take appropriate action” with regards to the report’s recommendations for “personnel responsible for supervising Major Hasan.” Those recommendations include career-ending reprimands for several of his superiors.

How can we hold these soldiers responsible for not preventing Hasan’s actions if we aren’t giving them the environment and the tools they need to confront Islamist radicalization? The military cannot allow the mantra of victimization of Muslims to dominate how it handles force protection. Islamist radicalization is real and it cannot be confronted unless we are honest about the threat it represents. Hasan is not the first soldier to be radicalized and he won’t be the last if we do not address the real issues.

I recently had a conversation with a friend who is a colonel in the U.S. Army and does quite a bit of force training. He had an interaction with one of the active-duty military imams, which concerned him, but because of political correctness he had nowhere to go with those concerns. … . He asked an active duty imam what he would say to a soldier who came to him asking if it was against “our faith” to fight against Muslims. … The Imam replied that he would refer the soldier to the Islamic Society of North America who is the outsourced certifying agency of Muslim Chaplains in the U.S. military. Unfortunately, ISNA is also a political Islamist organization that has been overly critical of the United States wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

ISNA glorified Imam Zaid Shakir’s response to the Fort Hood massacre as an example for their entire membership. As an American Muslim, I was frankly offended by his first paragraph demonstrating his and thus ISNA’s disdain for our military [which was]:

“There is no legitimate reason for their deaths, just as I firmly believe there is no legitimate reason for the deaths of the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi and Afghani civilians who have perished as a result of those two conflicts. Even though I disagree with the continued prosecution of those wars, and even though I believe that the US war machine is the single greatest threat to world peace, I must commend the top military brass at Fort Hood, and President Obama for encouraging restraint and for refusing to attribute the crime allegedly perpetrated by Major Nidal Malik Hasan to Islam.”

This is the organization that an active-duty imam uses for guidance? …

It is insane that they would utilize ISNA when they are part and parcel of the problem. ISNA’s roots are in the global project of the Muslim Brotherhood. They were listed as an unindicted co-conspirator in the successful Holy Land Foundation terror financing trial of 2008…

So far, so good. We do, however, have a difference of opinion with Dr Jasser when he writes:

As to the answer the imam should have given. He should have told the Colonel that he would counsel the Muslim military member that not only does his oath to this country and the military take precedence over any other oath, but the concept of the ummah (as Islamic nation) is dead and no longer relevant or competing for his allegiance from a spiritual perspective. There have been many wars fought between Muslims and this war is not a war against Muslims or Islam, but rather one to free the Iraqi and Afghani populations from their despots. If our active duty Muslim imams cannot confer such advice upon our Muslim soldiers they are a significant liability to our force protection. …

We see the war, whether it is fought in Iraq or Afghanistan or anywhere else, including the US itself, as Islam’s religiously motivated jihad against non-Muslims. If a Muslim such as Nidal Malik Hasan sees it as that, he must surely feel his allegiance to the US and its army is in competition with his allegiance to the ummah.

We agree with Dr Jasser’s recommendations:

The Pentagon’s review should be revised to look at the broader picture of Hasan’s path to radicalization through political Islam. They should analyze the warning signs that were visible and determine how the military could have better protected its soldiers. They should look at the threat that political Islam and its forms of radicalization have upon American Muslims and contractors that we employ abroad, like the informant who killed seven CIA officers last December.

The protection of our forces requires a better understanding of the enemy we face. An honest assessment of the Fort Hood massacre would not limit the scope of the review. It would also not allow the scapegoating of soldiers instead of fighting the root theo-political problems. Hasan’s victims deserve a full revision of how the United States military handles Islamist radicalization within its ranks. …

Oh, please no! View Comments

Diana West raises a troubling question:

Should Fox News register with the State Department as a foreign agent — an agent of Saudi Arabia?

First off, is that a farfetched question? Not when a leading member of the ruling family of the Sharia-totalitarian “kingdom” of Saudi Arabia, Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, has made himself the second-largest shareholder of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., Fox News’ parent company.

Just as Steven Emerson believes that American universities using Saudi mega-millions (many from Alwaleed) to set up Islamic studies departments should register as Saudi agents, I believe an American news channel part-owned and part-influenced by the Saudi prince should, too.

Alwaleed’s long march through U.S. institutions is a mainly post-9/11 progression greased by his purchase of about a 5.5 percent stake in News Corp. in 2005, and his purchases, I mean, gifts, of $20 million apiece to Georgetown and Harvard Universities, also in 2005.

There have been other eye-catching displays of Alwaleed’s largesse — $500,000 in 2002 to the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), a Hamas- and Muslim-Brotherhood-linked entity, and a whopping $27 million, also in 2002, to the families of Palestinian “martyrs,” aka suicide bombers. These, along with Alwaleed’s self-described “very close relationship” with Murdoch son and apparent heir-apparent James, a left-wing global-warmist with virulently anti-Israel views, should only deepen Americans’ concerns about Fox’s ties to “the prince.” Recently, Murdoch and Alwaleed have discussed expanding their business relationship through the Murdoch purchase of a substantial stake in Rotana, Alwaleed’s huge Arab media company.

Before entering his Murdoch association, Alwaleed gave a remarkably candid interview in 2002 about what Arab News described as his belief that “Arabs should focus more on penetrating U.S. public opinion as a means to influencing decision-making” rather than boycotting U.S. products, an idea of the moment.

The Arab News reported: “Arab countries can influence U.S. decision-making ‘if they unite through economic interests, not political,’ (Alwaleed) stressed. ‘We have to be logical and understand that the U.S. administration is subject to U.S. public opinion. We (Arabs) are not so active in this sphere (public opinion). And to bring the decision-maker on your side, you not only have to be active inside the U.S. Congress or the administration but also inside U.S. society.’”

And active inside U.S. society living rooms — even better. Alwaleed would seem to have hit on a Fox strategy some time after Rudy Giuliani refused to accept, on behalf of a 9/11-shattered New York City, his $10 million check-cum-lecture that essentially justified the al-Qaida attacks as having been a response to U.S. foreign policy. This was “such an egregious, outrageous, unfair offense that I would have nothing to do with his money either,” Sean Hannity said at the time on Fox News‘ “Hannity & Colmes,” his remarks (and those of other Fox personalities) recently re-examined by the left-wing group Media Matters. “This is a bad guy,” Hannity said. “Rudy was right to decline the money.” Bill Sammon called Alwaleed’s check “blood money,” adding, “we’re better off without it.”

How terribly ironic that this same “bad guy” is now a News Corp. blood-money bags, a boss who must be handled with care as, for example, Fox host Neil Cavuto did in a deferential interview with Alwaleed last month.

How does this influence Fox News coverage? It’s impossible to say. Alwaleed has bragged that it only took a phone call to ensure that Fox coverage of Muslim rioting in France not be described as “Muslim” rioting in France, a boast News Corp. has never denied….

Meanwhile, spokesmen for terrorism-linked and Alwaleed-endowed CAIR still appear on Fox shows, for example, while Dave Gaubatz and Paul Sperry, likely Fox guests as conservative authors of the sleeper-hit book “Muslim Mafia” (an expose of CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood), get zero airtime. The more important question becomes: How does Alwaleed’s stake in News Corp. affect what Fox News doesn’t cover?

If they don’t report, we can’t decide. This, for a Sharia prince, could be worth millions.

This is very disturbing.

For TV news we watch Fox almost exclusively. We are hugely entertained by Glenn Beck who’s doing a great job exposing the bad policies and bad policy-makers in the Obama administration. We regularly watch Bret Baier’s ‘Special Report’, eager to hear the opinions of Charles Krauthammer, Brit Hume, and Stephen Hayes. We quite often watch Sean Hannity. We bear with Bill O’Reilly because he brings us conservatives like Michelle Malkin who inform and interest us. We need Fox News.  If it is to become a propaganda instrument of the soft jihad we will be losing a highly valuable resource, irreplaceable as far as we can see.

Rupert Murdoch, what are you doing to us?

Enter the general of soft jihad View Comments

Tariq Ramadan is the General of Soft Jihad. For years he persisted in trying to get into the United States, and was sensibly refused entry.

Now, just when the weakness and incompetence of the Obama administration’s dealings with jihadists have been direfully exposed, and are being most angrily criticized, this Supremo of the Islamic campaign to conquer the world is suddenly allowed in, by order of Hillary Clinton.

Tariq Ramadan’s particular role is to direct Islamic conquest not by violence but by means of mass immigration and propaganda. He has defended wife-beating and all the cruelties of sharia, including stoning to death. Now he may freely spread his poisonous message in the United States to advance his menacing mission of subjugation.

From the Weekly Standard:

In a controversial move, the Obama administration has decided to lift Tariq Ramadan’s ban from the United States. Who is Tariq Ramadan? By birth, he is the grandson of Hassan al Banna – the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB). By word and deed, he is today a leading member of the European branch of the MB.

The MB is the mother organization for some of the terrorist groups that became part of al Qaeda’s core, including Ayman al Zawahiri’s Egyptian Islamic Jihad. Osama bin Laden himself was first wooed to the dark side by Muslim Brothers teaching in Saudi Arabia. The MB has also spawned other hardcore jihadist organizations, including Hamas. While the MB’s descendents have publicly disagreed over tactics at times (for example, Zawahiri has taken issue with Hamas’s participation in Palestinian elections), they still share the same long-term strategic vision: the re-establishment of an Islamic Caliphate capable of ruling the Muslim world and challenging the West. And that is what Tariq Ramadan believes in too.

Douglas Farah provides more information:

The lifting of the ban, ordered by Secretary of State Clinton, is a significant victory for the Brotherhood, who has sought to frame the issue of Ramadan’s exclusion as one of academic freedom rather one of national security.

Ramadan was ecstatic, saying on his blog:

Today’s decision reflects the Obama administration’s willingness to reopen the United States to the rest of the world, and to permit critical debate. Coming after nearly six years of inquiry and investigation, Secretary Clinton’s order confirms what I have affirmed and reaffirmed from day one: the first accusations of terrorist connections (subsequently dropped), then donations to Palestinian solidarity groups, were nothing more than a pretense to prohibit me from speaking critically about American government policy on American soil. The decision brings to an end a dark period in American politics that saw security considerations invoked to block critical debate through a policy of exclusion and baseless allegation. Today I am delighted at the decision. …

A rock star in the European Muslim scene, Ramadan, despite weak academic credentials, has been offered a teaching position at Notre Dame University….

This is typical of the Muslim Brotherhood. It is eager to use the freedoms that would never exist under the caliphate it so desires to create, in order to promote its totalitarian vision. It demands the right to be heard while being unequivocal in its unwillingness to view as equal anyone who does not embrace its view radical Islamism. While it is willing to use the democratic process to achieve its goals, often putting it at odds with militantly violent groups such as al Qaeda, in the end the Brotherhood and Osama bin Laden share an identical vision of what the world should look like under Allah’s rule.

Pacifists for jihad View Comments

What could explain why these American women are seeking an alliance with the Muslim Brotherhood?

We can think of no answer but ignorance and stupidity – and possibly also sheer malice.

From David Horowitz’s Newsreal:

As Americans keep a wary eye on Muslim radicals in Yemen, little attention is being given to a far more dangerous enemy right in our own backyard. Under the banner of ‘anti-war’ activism, the radical group Code Pink is running banner advertisements on the English language version of the official Web site of a terrorist sympathizing group, the Muslim Brotherhood, one of which invites the Muslim Brotherhood to “join us in cleansing our country.”

The ad is entitled ‘Arrest The War Criminals.’ Only problem is, Code Pink believes the war criminals are none other than George W. Bush and Co. And they’re actively recruiting radical Muslim terrorists to help them in their cause.

A link on the ad goes to a web site that actually calls for the kidnapping of former President George W. Bush, his wife Laura, his family, and various former administration officials. To date, not a peep has been heard from the Secret Service.

Maybe that’s because Jodie Evans, the co-founder of Code Pink was a top fundraiser for Barack Obama. Or maybe not.

This isn’t the first time the rabid feminist anti-war group has had amicable ties with terrorists. As Andrew Breitbart’s Big Government reports:

“The Muslim Brotherhood published a statement by Code Pink issued in May to promote Code Pink’s trip to Gaza that month. In December, the Muslim Brotherhood published an open letter to Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak by Code Pink and the Gaza Freedom March decrying the Egyptian government’s refusal to allow the group passage into Gaza.”

Once again, yet another radical group is discovered to have close ties to President Obama….

Most alarming …  is the absolute media silence…. The media ‘watchdogs’ are asleep and the ones we trust to protect us are instead offering aid and comfort to our enemies when they’re not prosecuting Navy Seals, CIA officials and anyone else whose job is to keep America safe.

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