Posted on 04/19/2005 1:02:42 AM PDT by JohnHuang2
How many people do you know personally who have been convicted of supporting terrorism?
How many people associated with your company have been convicted of supporting terrorism?
How many people associated with organizations in which you are a member or a leader have been convicted of supporting terrorism?
If you're like most Americans, the answer to all three questions is probably none. If you're like me and most other Arab-Americans, the answer is still probably none.
What would you say about an organization linked to at least three people convicted of supporting terrorism?
Would it begin to raise more than suspicions in your mind?
Would it send a very serious message to you that such an organization should be viewed with caution and relied upon as a source of information and analysis only with the gravest warnings?
I think so.
There is such an organization in America – and it continues to be used as a source by major media in this country. Its spokesmen continue to get face time on television without any caveats. In fact, it continues to be billed as an American-Muslim "civil rights" group.
I'm talking about the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a powerful, wealthy and influential pro-Islam lobby actively working in the media and political spotlight.
Last week, a third person associated with CAIR was found guilty of supporting terrorism.
His name is Gassan Elashi. He was convicted along with two brothers in Dallas of channeling funds to a high-ranking official of the terrorist group Hamas. Elashi was a founder and board member of the Texas chapter of CAIR – and, astonishingly, the third CAIR figure to be convicted on federal terrorism charges since Sept. 11, 2001.
At some point, the law of averages and the statistical improbability that this is just some incredible coincidence needs to be addressed by CAIR and the media and political elite who turn to this organization regularly as if it truly represents the diverse voices of Arab-Americans and Muslim-Americans.
Elashi, by the way, as chairman of the Holy Land Foundation, was convicted last year of making illegal technology transfers to two terror-sponsoring states, Libya and Syria. Just before the Holy Land Foundation was indicted by the U.S. Justice Department, it was threatening to sue me and my news organization for defamation for exposing its connections to terrorism.
Founded in 1994, CAIR is a spin-off of the Islamic Association of Palestine, identified as a "front group" for the Hamas terrorists, according to Steve Pomerantz, former chief of the FBI's counterterrorism section.
Another ex-FBI counterterrorism chief, Oliver "Buck" Revell, has called the Islamic Association For Palestine "a front organization for Hamas that engages in propaganda for Islamic militants."
CAIR advisery board member Siraj Wahhaj was named by U.S. Attorney Mary Jo White on Feb. 2, 1995, as one of the "unindicted persons who may be alleged as co-conspirators in the attempt to blow up New York City monuments," including the World Trade Center in 1993.
Other CAIR figures convicted of terror-related crimes include Randall Todd "Ismail" Royer, a former communications specialist and civil-rights coordinator, and Bassem Khafagi, former director of community relations.
Royer was sentenced to 20 years in prison on charges he trained in Virginia for holy war against the United States and sent several members to Pakistan to join Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Kashmiri terrorist group with reported ties to al-Qaida.
Khafagi was arrested in January 2003 while serving with CAIR and convicted on fraud and terrorism charges.
I wonder how many CAIR employees and organizers need to be convicted on terrorism charges before it is no longer taken seriously as a Muslim "civil-rights" group by the press and political establishment and before the federal government opens an investigation of the organization itself.
This is an excellent article.
Connections to terrorism don't bother the MSM. While nominally against terrrorism, the main stream media (MSM) in fact feels the terrorists have a lot of "legitimate gripes" and the MSM in fact sympathize with terrorists. They don't admit it publically (except in the case of Palestinian terrorists, with whom they blatantly side with against the Israelis) but that is how they feel. The Left's attitude toward this is evident on college campuses.
The MSM and the terrorists are on the same side. They see the US military as the primary problem in the world, the main enemy. That is why the MSM works to undermine our troops in Iraq.
Keep up the good work.
Ping
Hamas ping!
CAIR...sister to the ACLU Ping!
>> The MSM and the terrorists are on the same side. <<
That's how I see it.
Thanks for the ping Jan.
They all have the same ultimate goal which is to take away the Freedoms we enjoy and destroy this great Country.
Thanks for the ping Jan.
I am convinced that the outfits like CAIR were well on their way to infiltrating all sectors of our government, schools and society at large for quite a long time before 9/11.
These oh-so-clever, filthy islamists must be furious with osama bin laden for rocking their boat on 9/11.
We are now on to them, and they know it.
This is why they have changed their tactics from being such 'reasonable' and precious purveyors of the religion of peace to defense of the 'innocent' religion of peace.
They jump into every situation in which they think there might be offense to islam.
They are no longer so smooth and articulate. They protest too much at imagined slight.
We must keep them unbalanced.
For any islamic lurkers....we are on to you now.
WE HAVE READ THE KORAN...why don't you read the Bible?
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