{"id":91507,"date":"2021-12-10T17:05:35","date_gmt":"2021-12-10T15:05:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/?p=91507"},"modified":"2021-12-10T10:56:09","modified_gmt":"2021-12-10T08:56:09","slug":"14-05-78","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/?p=91507","title":{"rendered":"CAIR\u2019s Antisemitism Ignored or Embraced by Elected Officials"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>CAIR\u2019s Antisemitism Ignored or Embraced by Elected Officials<\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/h5>\n

Steven Emerson<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

The CAIR logo. Photo: Wiki Commons.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

This is Part 2 of a two-part series excerpted from a book being published next year on CAIR\u2019s long antisemitic track record by the Investigative Project on Terrorism. To read the pre<\/i>vious installment,\u00a0click here.<\/a><\/i><\/strong><\/p>\n

Although the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has a\u00a0long and documented history<\/a>\u00a0of attacking Jews and Israel, many American elected officials don\u2019t seem to mind.<\/span><\/p>\n

A November 20 Chicago virtual\u00a0fundraiser<\/a>\u00a0sponsored by the self-professed American Muslim civil rights organization, drew five members of Congress, a US senator, governor, and attorney general. They praised the group\u2019s fight against hate and bigotry, and its alleged commitment to justice.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cFor decades, CAIR-Chicago has been the leading Muslim community organization in the area,\u201d\u00a0claimed<\/a>\u00a0Illinois Senator\u00a0Dick Durbin (D)<\/a>. It has \u201cbeen at the forefront of so many issues, protecting civil liberties, informing your voters, providing services to the community.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Not only was Durbin \u201cproud of CAIR-Chicago\u2019s leadership in our community,\u201d but he also looked forward to working with it on \u201cmany shared goals.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

More than 50 elected officials, including Durbin, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker, Lt. Governor Juliana Stratton, and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot also\u00a0sent<\/a>\u00a0CAIR-Chicago letters to help its annual fundraiser.<\/span><\/p>\n

Pritzker described CAIR-Chicago\u2019s achievements as \u201cremarkable.\u201d Others praised CAIR\u2019s role as \u201ca crucial voice for the Muslim community\u201d in the fight against \u201cbigotry and hate.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

But no speaker mentioned the\u00a0bigoted message<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0antisemitic narratives<\/a>\u00a0pushed by CAIR since its\u00a0founding<\/a>\u00a0more than 25 years ago. Nor did they explain how it was possible to fight bigotry and hate when the organization is led by bigots and haters.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cF*** Zionism. And F*** you too France,\u201d\u00a0wrote<\/a>\u00a0CAIR\u2019s National Strategic Communications Director and Chicago chapter Director\u00a0Ahmed Rehab<\/a>\u00a0in 2019, after\u00a0the\u00a0French parliament\u00a0adopted<\/a>\u00a0the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA)\u2019s working definition of antisemitism.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Rehab has a history of spewing antisemitic hate. While a DePaul University student in 1996, he wrote\u00a0an essay<\/a>\u00a0that minimized the Holocaust, and claimed an exchange he saw on a Charlie Rose show \u201cconfirmed the Jewish control over the media.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

A forthcoming Investigative Project on Terrorism (IPT) book will expose details of CAIR\u2019s long history of incendiary antisemitic statements, and show how they violate the IHRA\u2019s\u00a0working definition<\/a>\u00a0of antisemitism,\u00a0adopted<\/a>\u00a0by the US State Department in 2016, and by numerous world governments since.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rehab, who moderated the CAIR-Chicago fundraiser,\u00a0described<\/a>\u00a0Durbin, Pritzker, and other speakers as \u201cour key allies \u2026 big tent allies in Congress and beyond.\u201d He also recognized two Chicago-area Islamist leaders, one of whom was a featured speaker, among some of CAIR-Chicago\u2019s \u201clongest standing supporters.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Prosecutors in a 2008 Federal terrorism financing trial\u00a0named<\/a>\u00a0these leaders, Kifah Mustapha and Jamal Said, as part of a former Hamas-support network in the United States.<\/span><\/p>\n

CAIR was\u00a0identified<\/a>\u00a0as an unindicted co-conspirator in the trial, which ended with\u00a0convictions<\/a>\u00a0against the\u00a0Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF)<\/a>\u00a0and five former officers for illegally funneling millions of dollars to Hamas.<\/span><\/p>\n

That outcome should not come as a surprise.<\/span><\/p>\n

CAIR\u00a0emerged<\/a>\u00a0in 1994 from a Muslim Brotherhood-created network called the\u00a0\u201cPalestine Committee,\u201d<\/a>\u00a0which was formed to\u00a0help\u00a0Hamas politically and financially in the United States.<\/span><\/p>\n

CAIR\u2019s founding members, including its current executive director\u00a0Nihad Awad<\/a>, were leaders of the\u00a0Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP),<\/a>\u00a0which served as the Palestine Committee\u2019s propaganda arm.<\/span><\/p>\n

IAP\u00a0held joint conferences<\/a>\u00a0in the 1980s and 1990s with the\u00a0Muslim American Youth Association (MAYA)<\/a>\u00a0that were hotbeds of antisemitic propaganda.<\/span><\/p>\n

Hamas military wing leader Muhammed Siyam\u00a0spoke<\/a>\u00a0at the 1995 New Year\u2019s convention in Los Angeles. \u201cFinish off the Israelis,\u201d he said. \u201cKill them all! Exterminate them! No peace ever! Do not bother to talk politics.\u201d Copies of the notorious antisemitic forgery \u201cThe Protocols of the Elders of Zion\u201d were\u00a0sold<\/a>\u00a0at the same conference. A MAYA conference in August 1994 distributed an IAP\u00a0booklet<\/a>\u00a0called \u201cAmerica\u2019s Greatest Enemy: THE JEW! and an UNHOLY ALLIANCE,\u201d which featured Jewish and Zionist conspiracies for global domination, as well as Holocaust denial claims.<\/span><\/p>\n

As IAP\u2019s progeny, CAIR continues to serve the same agenda. Its leadership has\u00a0repeatedly<\/a>\u00a0pushed dual-loyalty smears, canards about Jewish control over American policy, described Israel as a racist and genocidal state, and called for its destruction.<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

In August, Awad protested President Biden\u2019s\u00a0meeting<\/a>\u00a0with new Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett. Hosting Bennett,\u00a0Awad argued, is as bad as welcoming the Taliban to the White House.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cImagine if [the] Taliban forms the government, [and] continues to do what it was doing to the people in Afghanistan before they were defeated in 2001,\u201d Awad said outside the White House. \u201cAnd they became national and international leaders, and if the president of the United States, President Joe Biden, decides to host in the White House the leader of [the] Taliban, what would be the reaction of the US media? What would be the reaction from the public? What would be the reaction of politicians by the fact that Joe Biden would be hosting the leader of [the] Taliban?<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cToday it\u2019s no different. President Joe Biden is hosting the leader of the Israeli Taliban. Joe Biden is hosting the leader of the settler colonial movement in Israel,\u201d Awad said.<\/span><\/p>\n

CAIR San Francisco Bay Area executive director\u00a0Zahra Billoo<\/a>\u00a0has\u00a0called<\/a> for the destruction of the Jewish state: \u201cFrom the river to the sea, #Palestine will be free,\u201d she wrote on Twitter, evoking a popular slogan among Israel-bashers that leaves no room on the map for Israel.<\/span><\/p>\n