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A Troubling Influence - An Islamic Fifth Column penetrates the White House
FrontPageMagazine ^ | 12/09/03 | Frank J Gaffney Jr.

Posted on 12/09/2003 1:37:45 AM PST by kattracks

Why We Are Publishing This Article by David Horowitz

The article you are about to read is the most disturbing that we at frontpagemag.com have ever published. As an Internet magazine, with a wide circulation, we have been in the forefront of the effort to expose the radical Fifth Column in this country, whose agendas are at odds with the nation’s security, and whose purposes are hostile to its own. In his first address to Congress after 9/11, the President noted that we are facing the same totalitarian enemies we faced in the preceding century. It is not surprising that their domestic supporters in the American Left should have continued their efforts to weaken this nation and tarnish its image. Just as there was a prominent internal Fifth Column during the Cold War, so there has been a prominent Fifth Column during the war on terror.

By no means do all the opponents of America’s war policies (or even a majority) fit this category. Disagreement among citizens is a core feature of any democracy and respect for that disagreement is a foundational value of our political system. The self-declared enemies of the nation are distinguished by the intemperate nature of their attacks on America and its President – referring to the one as Adolf Hitler, for example, or the other as the world’s “greatest terrorist state.” They are known as well by their political choices and associations. Many leaders of the movement opposing the war in Iraq have worked for half a century with the agents of America’s communist enemies and with totalitarian states like Cuba and the former USSR.

We have had no compunction about identifying these individuals and groups. America is no longer protected by geographical barriers or by its unsurpassed military technologies. Today terrorists who can penetrate our borders with the help of Fifth Column networks will have access to weapons of mass destruction that can cause hundreds of thousands of American deaths.  One slip in our security defenses can result in a catastrophe undreamed of before.

What is particularly disturbing, about the information in this article by former Reagan Defense official, Frank Gaffney, is that it concerns an individual who loves this country and would be the last person to wish it harm, and the first one would expect to defend it. I have known Grover Norquist for almost twenty years as a political ally. Long before I myself was cognizant of the Communist threat – indeed when I was part of one of those Fifth Column networks – Grover Norquist was mobilizing his countrymen to combat it. In the early 1980s, Grover was in the forefront of conservative efforts to get the Reagan Administration to support the liberation struggles of anti-Communists in Central America, Africa and Afghanistan.

It is with a heavy heart therefore, that I am posting this article, which is the most complete documentation extant of Grover Norquist’s activities in behalf of the Islamist Fifth Column. I have confronted Grover about these issues and have talked to others who have done likewise. But it has been left to Frank Gaffney and a few others, including Daniel Pipes and Steven Emerson, to make the case and to suffer the inevitable recriminations that have followed earlier disclosures of some aspects of this story.

Up to now, the controversy over these charges has been dismissed or swept under the rug, as a clash of personalities or the product of one of those intra-bureaucratic feuds so familiar to the Washington scene. Unfortunately, this is wishful thinking. The reality is much more serious. No one reading this document to its bitter end will confuse its claims and confirming evidence with those of a political cat fight. On the basis of the evidence assembled here, it seems beyond dispute that Grover Norquist has formed alliances with prominent Islamic radicals who have ties to the Saudis and to Libya and to Palestine Islamic Jihad, and who are now under indictment by U.S. authorities. Equally troubling is that the arrests of these individuals and their exposure as agents of terrorism have not resulted in noticeable second thoughts on Grover’s part or any meaningful effort to dissociate himself from his unsavory friends.

As Frank Gaffney’s article recounts, Grover’s own Islamic Institute was initially financed by one of the most notorious of these operatives, Abdurahman Alamoudi, a supporter of Hamas and Hezbollah who told the Annual Convention of the Islamic Association of Palestine in 1996, “If we are outside this country we can say ‘Oh, Allah destroy America.’ But once we are here, our mission in this country is to change it.” Grover appointed Alamoudi’s deputy, Khaled Saffuri to head his own organization. Together they gained access to the White House for Alamoudi and Sami al-Arian and others with similar agendas who used their cachet to spread Islamist influence to the American military and the prison system and the universities and the political arena with untold consequences for the nation.

Parts of this story have been published before, but never in such detail and never with the full picture of Islamist influence in view. No doubt, that is partly because of Grover Norquist’s large (and therefore intimidating) presence in the Washington community. Many have been quite simply afraid to raise these issues and thus have allowed Grover to make them seem a matter of individual personality differences. This suits his agendas well, as it does those of his Islamist allies. If matters in dispute reflect personal animosity or “racial” prejudice, as Grover insists, then the true gravity of these charges is obscured. The fact remains that while Grover has denied the charges or sought to dismiss them with such arguments on many occasions, he has never answered them. If he wishes to do so now, the pages of frontpagemag.com are open to him.

Many have been reluctant to support these charges or to make them public because they involve a prominent conservative. I am familiar with these attitudes from my years on the Left. Loyalty is an important political value, but there comes a point where loyalty to friends or to parties comes into conflict with loyalty to fundamental principles and ultimately to one’s country. Grover’s activities have reached that point. E.M. Forster, a weak-spirited liberal, once said that if he had to choose between betraying his country and his friends, he “hoped [he] would have the guts” to betray his country.

No such sentiment motivates this journal. In our war with the Islamo-fascists we are all engaged in a battle with evil on a scale that affects the lives and freedoms of hundreds of millions people outside this nation as well as within it. America is on the front line of this battle and there is no replacement waiting in the wings if it fails, or if its will to fight is sapped from within. This makes our individual battles to keep our country vigilant and strong the most important responsibilities we have. That is why we could not in good conscience do otherwise, than to bring this story to light.

 


(Excerpt) Read more at frontpagemag.com ...


TOPICS: Editorial; Extended News; News/Current Events; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: ageofliberty; alamoudi; alarian; alitulbah; alkebsi; alnajjar; alqaeda; alzawahiri; amc; ampcc; atr; awad; blackmuslim; bobj; bray; cair; davidhorowitz; elashi; enemywithin; fifthcolumn; frankjgaffneyjr; gaffneynorquist; grovernorquist; hamas; hezbollah; horowitz; iara; islamicinstitute; isna; khafagi; khaledsaffuri; khan; mpac; mrus; mwl; ncppf; norquist; patriotact; pij; rove; royer; saeed; saffuri; secretservice; siddiqi; suhailkhan; todayspurge; vickers; wahhabi; yousefyee; yusuf
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To: JohnGalt
The 'Friends of Boeing' certainly turned it into an embarrassment.

They sure didn't help. But Boeing's gotten so over-the-top (pilfered documents from Lockheed-Martin, et cetera) with their ethics problems, the "Friends of Boeing" couldn't clean that turd up no matter how hard they tried.

741 posted on 12/17/2003 12:31:08 PM PST by Poohbah ("Beware the fury of a patient man" -- John Dryden)
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To: Poohbah
Yeah, that makes sense.

I should have Freep Mailed the link. My only point was to link to a public intellectual who held both parties accountable.

742 posted on 12/17/2003 12:32:15 PM PST by JohnGalt ("Nothing happened on 9/11 to make the federal government more competent.")
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To: Trollstomper
Roper Center, a bit more expert that Norquist on the subject of polls, votes and numbers, says the 2002 Muslim voter turnout was .3 percent. Even if they ALL voted for the GOP, what would that be?
743 posted on 12/17/2003 12:45:26 PM PST by Trollstomper
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To: Trollstomper
Norquist called Gaffney and others, "Racists and bigots"

Yes he did, because Anti-Arab racism is rampant, even here on lofty FR. That racial bigotry is often found growing with anti-muslim religious bigotry, like a slime mold or lichen under a rock.

Thank you for pointing that out.

744 posted on 12/17/2003 12:45:54 PM PST by EverFree (Stompelot?)
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To: Poohbah
Setting aside the facts given you re $ to Gaffney v $ to Norquist, as you clearly want to ignore, you then say:

"The 'Friends of Boeing' certainly turned it into an embarrassment."


And friends of AlArian and Alamoudi and Awad have turned out to be what?
745 posted on 12/17/2003 12:48:32 PM PST by Trollstomper
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To: Sabertooth
If we are to take your exhortations to heart, all Muslims are on a jihad to exterminate the non-Muslim world and every adherent a terrorist and completely irredeemable.

So, exactly how do you plan on exterminating the 1 billion Muslims in the world?
746 posted on 12/17/2003 12:50:52 PM PST by Bob J (www.freerepublic.net www.radiofreerepublic.com...check them out!)
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To: Bob J
We didn't have to kill every German or every Japanese to stop them.
747 posted on 12/17/2003 12:53:52 PM PST by aristeides
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To: EverFree
Always happy to point out lies and mistatements of facts.
748 posted on 12/17/2003 12:56:03 PM PST by Trollstomper
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Comment #749 Removed by Moderator

To: Trollstomper
lies and misstatements of facts.

Norquist was painted as exclusively using the race card. I corrected that by saying he exclusively used the religion card, forcing you to point out that he actually was talking about *both* religious and racial bigotry ("Racists and bigots").

I love it when a plan comes together.

750 posted on 12/17/2003 1:07:54 PM PST by EverFree (Cachetroll?)
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To: EverFree
Posted by EverFree to Trollstomper
On News/Activism 12/17/2003 1:01:00 PM PST #749 of 749

"Neocons are Trotskyite-Bukharinite, but anti-Stalin, Bolsheviks who infiltrate and use America's Military-industrial complex to further their Comintern goals of permanent global "democratic" revolution. And enrich themselves, too. EG PerleGate."


Oh I see. I hope everyone else is clear on this matter. Bye-bye
751 posted on 12/17/2003 1:09:53 PM PST by Trollstomper
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To: Nick Danger
Frank Gaffney stands outside the meeting room on Wednesdays and hands out his materials. I've read them. People take that stuff and walk right into the meeting with Grover Norquist. David Keene; David Frum; Chuck Muth; people from the White House; the Senate; the House; the Pentagon; the Cato Institute; the Heritage Foundation; the NRA; people running for office from all over the country. They walk right past Frank Gaffney and into Grover's meeting. That is what I see.

< -snip- >

I have no idea what to think about a pissing contest between Frank Gaffney and Grover Norquist. I look around and it doesn't look to me like "old Washington hands" are paying much attention to Frank.

Some of the old hands you just cited:

Here now is where the story gets painful for us Bush Republicans. Not only were the al-Arians not avoided by the Bush White House - they were actively courted. Candidate Bush allowed himself to be photographed with the al-Arian family while campaigning in Florida. Candidate Bush denounced the immigration laws that detained - and ultimately deported - Mazen al-Najjar. In May 2001, Sami al-Arian was invited into the White House complex for a political briefing for Muslim-American leaders. The next month his son, Abdullah, who was then an intern in the office of Congressman David Bonior, joined a delegation of Muslim leaders at a meeting with John DiIulio, head of the Office of Faith-Based Initiatives. After the group entered the complex, a red flag belatedly popped up over the al-Arian name, and the Secret Service ordered him out of the complex. The entire delegation marched out with young al-Arian - and soon afterward, President Bush personally apologized to the young man and ordered the deputy director of the Secret Service to apologize as well.

(Young al-Arian published a strikingly disingenuous account of this experience in the online edition of Newsweek on - note the date - September 14, 2001. Newsweek - a magazine normally celebrated for its rigorous fact-checking - permitted young al-Arian to claim on its site that he had been "singled out" only because of his "name and physical features." Now in one sense that's true - had Abdullah al-Arian been named Abdullah al-Shmarian, nobody at the Secret Service would have troubled him. But al-Arian and Newsweek cooperated in leaving the reader with a very false impression that he had been the victim of some kind of bigoted anti-Muslim dragnet.)

The al-Arian case was not a solitary lapse. The Bush campaign in 2000 very determinedly reached out to Muslim voters. Indeed, Muslim-Americans may have tipped the election to George Bush. One survey suggests that the 50,000 Muslim voters of Florida, normally staunch Democrats, reacted to Al Gore's selection of Joe Lieberman as his running mate by voting 80% for Bush. That outreach campaign opened relationships between the Bush campaign and some very disturbing persons in the Muslim-American community. Many of those disturbing persons were invited to stand beside the president at post-9/11 events, like his meeting with Muslim community leaders at the Massachusetts Avenue mosque.

Over the past year, the White House has become much more selective about its invitations. More selective - but still far from selective enough.

There is one way that we Republicans are very lucky - we face political opponents too crippled by political correctness to make an issue of these kinds of security lapses. At least - so far. But who knows? The day may come when some Democrat decides he cares more about winning elections than he does about liberal pieties. Against the day, is it too much to ask a wartime White House - please, please choose your friends more prudently!

Correction

Memory failed me on point above: Sami al-Arian's visit to the White House occurred in June 2001, not May; his son's visit was later in the same month.
David Frum's Diary - National Review Online
FEB. 21, 2003: THE STRANGE CASE OF SAMI AL-ARIAN


President Bush has come under some criticism recently for his outreach to the U.S. Muslim community because administration officials have apparently met with some groups that have ties -- direct or indirect -- with extremist groups here and in the Middle East.

Still, and in spite of the criticism he continues to reach out.

The president's position is understandable and even commendable. He doesn't want to do anything to make it appear that he's leading an anti-Muslim crusade because this would drive millions of Muslims into the extremist camp with Osama bin Laden and his buddies.

The problem is that the ideology driving the terrorists is in fact religion-based. Wahhabism is more than just the state-sponsored religion of Saudi Arabia. It is a branch of Islam that is warlike, anti-Western and bent upon our destruction. These folks hate us as well as any Muslim that doesn't dance to their tune. They have been responsible, in fact, for the slaughter of literally millions of their fellow Muslims in their drive to remake one of the world's major religions in their own image.

If the Wahhabis restricted their activities to the Middle East, it would be bad enough, but they're also active here. Thanks to their Saudi sponsors, they have leveraged resources to recruit followers on our college campuses, to create a virtual base in our prisons, and establish cells wherever Muslims gather. They control well over half the mosques in this country and virtually every organization that purports to speak for Muslim interests.

Make no mistake about it ... these people are our enemies. To deny this would be foolish and to empower them in any way is a mistake of the first order because doing so legitimizes their claim to speak for all Muslims.

The problem is that moderate Muslims control few organizations and have virtually no voice. Most of them, in fact, know better than to challenge the Wahhabis.

Non-Muslim experts know too that challenging the Wahhabis' extremist view of the world can be dangerous. Anyone who even remotely threatens the Wahhabis can expect to be denounced by supposedly mainline Muslim organizations and their friends as anti-Muslim and a religious bigot to boot.

These groups are, in the main, acting as de facto defenders of the sponsors of extremist terrorism. Those who would defend this country are not lumping all Muslims together. It is the Wahhabis and their fellow travelers that see the Muslim population as a homogeneous sea in which they swim, hide and operate.

I have run into these zealots twice in the last six months or so. On both occasions their targets were recognized experts on Islam and terrorism who they denounced as "racists," "bigots" and men "who know absolutely nothing about Islam or the Middle East."

In both instances they sought veto power over who should or should not be allowed to discuss the extremist Muslim connection to world terrorism and in both instances they were rebuffed. Having failed to keep the objects of their enmity from speaking, they then proceeded to denounce publicly in the press and on the Internet the sponsors of the events at which they spoke as, you guessed it, "bigots and racists."

So who were these ignoramuses whom the Islamists see as mere bigots running around the country slandering an entire religion?

You've probably heard of both of them. One is Terry Emerson, a prize-winning journalist, who produced a major television report on the influence of Muslim extremists in this country. His "Jihad in America" aired on PBS, that hothouse of religious extremism and bigotry, and won him recognition as a leading journalistic expert on terrorism. He writes and lectures extensively on the subject and is called upon for analysis by the networks and the government, among others.

The other is Dan Pipes. Formerly of the Chicago and Harvard faculties, Pipes is currently director of the Middle East Forum. He has published at least 10 books including Militant Islam Reaches America, which has been widely praised for its analysis of just this problem.

I think I know why the Wahhabis hate these guys and will do anything they can to silence them. It's not because Emerson and Pipes are kooks, bigots or racists. And it's certainly not because they don't know what they're talking about.

Rather, it's because they know exactly what they're talking about. Neither man has ever said that all Muslims are the same and neither has ever tried to blame either mainstream Islam or its millions of followers for the war in which we are engaged.

The only people who have argued that no distinctions can or should be drawn among Muslims are the Wahhabis and their apologists and that should tell us all we need to know about both.
Muslim extremists seeking to foster one Islamic world
David A. Keene | February 19th, 2003


About 150 people will appreciate the exquisiteness of Z. Hallow's story about a rift between Grover Norquist and … lobbyists David Keene and Frank Gaffney. See if you can guess which side Mr. Hallow supports. LINK

"Veteran conservative activist Grover Norquist, credited with helping swing Muslim voters to support President Bush in the 2000 elections, has been accused of suppressing criticism of radical Islamic influence at the White House."

"Influential national defense specialist Frank Gaffney and American Conservative Union President David A. Keene yesterday separately accused Mr. Norquist of employing 'Stalinist tactics' against those who disagree with Mr. Norquist's role in brokering access to the Bush White House."

"Mr. Norquist had accused Mr. Gaffney and some of his allies in the conservative movement of 'racism' and religious bigotry."

"Mr. Norquist yesterday barred Mr. Gaffney from attending the regular Wednesday morning meetings of conservative Capitol Hill aides and interest-group representatives held in Mr. Norquist's L Street offices. The White House regularly sends a representative to the meetings, at which Mr. Rove has occasionally been the featured speaker."

"In disputes with organizers of two recent conservative conferences, Mr. Norquist warned his critics to back off because Mr. Bush and Mr. Rove were on his side. Norquist critics said that at various times he has told them that the president and Mr. Rove were angry with Mr. Gaffney and Middle East scholars Daniel Pipes and Steve Emory for, in Mr. Norquist's view, painting all American Muslims with the broad brush of radical Islamic terrorism."
ABC News link
WASHINGTON, February 7th, 2003

Here's an old hand you didn't mention...

Paul Weyrich, head of the Free Congress Foundation, a conservative Washington lobbying group, calls Mr. Norquist's dealings with Muslims "very dangerous." Mr. Weyrich adds, "We have to acknowledge we're at war and that it's very possible some of the Muslims want to establish a fifth column in this country."
Reaching Out: In Difficult Times, Muslims Count On Unlikely Advocate ---
Mr. Norquist, Famed Tax Foe, Offers Washington Access, Draws Conservative Flak --- Meeting an Alleged Terrorist

The Wall Street Journal - Tom Hamburger and Glenn R. Simpson | June 11, 2003
(Google HTML of a Gaffney .pdf link - scroll to page 2

FR link

752 posted on 12/17/2003 1:19:33 PM PST by Sabertooth
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To: JohnGalt; diotima
Funny, someone pressed the abuse button on my 703; I think I outed Gaffney as a Boeing Stooge and linked to Sailer's VDARE article.

vDare's a mixed bag, but I'd just as soon the link stayed, myself. Yours wasn't the first post to link to Sailor's article at vDare that's been nuked on this thread, see this deleted post.

Not everything is a conspiracy.


753 posted on 12/17/2003 1:26:28 PM PST by Sabertooth
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To: Sabertooth
I didn't suggest a conspiracy, I was simply curious as to who pressed the abuse button.

Nobody likes a rat and all that...

754 posted on 12/17/2003 1:28:45 PM PST by JohnGalt ("Nothing happened on 9/11 to make the federal government more competent.")
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Comment #755 Removed by Moderator

To: Bob J
Don't make it a debate about the number of muslims who are jihadis.

The point is that if the moderates are the ones we wish to woo, then moderates and not jihadis should be made welcome instead of ignored.

And Saudi money masquerading as domestic money, ostensibly to represent domestic muslims, when in reality it acts as a espionage/propaganda organization for a state whose theology wishes our destruction, is something to be questioned, no?

Grover has acted a gatekeeper to the other schools of islam, acting solely on behalf of a jihadi ideology.

He is undercutting the President's very strategy when he promotes only one school of islam as the correct one.

Decrying bigotry in others, Grover seems rather irrationally inclined to be prejudiced against any aspect of islamic theology apart from the wahhabs.

756 posted on 12/17/2003 1:31:27 PM PST by swarthyguy
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To: Bob J
If we are to take your exhortations to heart, all Muslims are on a jihad to exterminate the non-Muslim world and every adherent a terrorist and completely irredeemable.

So, exactly how do you plan on exterminating the 1 billion Muslims in the world?

Hey Bob, either find evidence that I've said "all Muslims are on a jihad to exterminate the non-Muslim world and every adherent a terrorist and completely irredeemable," or quit beating your wife.

Seriously, don't be a punk, go get the specific links and quotes.


757 posted on 12/17/2003 1:33:12 PM PST by Sabertooth
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To: Poohbah
Trollstomper signed up 12/11/03 and has only posted on this thread.

If he doesn't explain himself, be he once banned, using multiple handles, or is involved with the story, pay him no mind-- not that you were.
758 posted on 12/17/2003 1:52:31 PM PST by JohnGalt ("Nothing happened on 9/11 to make the federal government more competent.")
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To: kattracks
bump for later read
759 posted on 12/17/2003 1:56:11 PM PST by EverOnward
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To: JohnGalt; Trollstomper
I take it you're accusing Trollstomper of being a fraud. Could you please explain why you think this, or at least direct me to the postings that contain the evidence that supports your view?
760 posted on 12/17/2003 1:56:18 PM PST by aristeides
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