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Please read just a few of the headlines that World Net Daily has published.
August, 2006
LAW OF THE LAND
'China-level' Christian persecution coming
Pastors say court's ruling in Houston Bible case 'breath-taking'
A few more court decisions like this week's over a display of a Bible in Houston and the United States will be approaching the "China-level" for Christian persecution, according to a leader in the midst of that battle.
The ruling from the Fifth Court of Appeals said the display of a Bible on public ground in Houston to honor the founder of a mission has to go, not because it was unconstitutional itself, but because it became unconstitutional when a Christian group rallied around it.
The pastor's group said that means any monument, building, or even feature of nature is an illegal "establishment of religion" if a church ceremony is held there.
"Connecting the dots between the eminent domain case, which says all of your churches are up for grabs if a town wants a mall, secondly you now have been told you do not have constitutional rights in the public square," Dave Welch, executive director of the Houston Area Pastors Conference, told WorldNetDaily.
"Any kind of an event is okay, as long as you didn't express any religious faith. What is that telling you?
"We're not persecuted yet, we know that. But we're on our way there. Add that to the surprising acceptance of militant Islam, the fear of speaking against that from a Christian standpoint and then we're dangerously approaching the point where we have literally given away and yielded our freedoms that were earned," Welch said.
"We have history, law and the founding fathers who adopted the Constitution collectively affirming the truth expressed by revered Justice Joseph Story in 1840 that, 'We are not to attribute this prohibition of a national religious establishment to an indifference to religion in general, and especially to Christianity,'" said a statement issued by the pastor's group.
Welch told WND that the court's conclusion was "ludicrous" and if followed logically, could mean that a religious rally at any public building would therefore make the building unconstitutional so it would have to be removed.
The Bible was installed on county property about five decades ago in honor of William Mosher, the founder of Star of Hope Mission, and was replaced in 1996 with donated funds. However, an atheist challenged the monument, and on an appeal from the District Court decision that the Bible was unconstitutional, the appeals court carried the argument further.
Its ruling said that the monument became an unconstitutional "establishment" after a 2003 rally was held by Christians to defend the display. That rally involved prayers and clergy, the court noted.
"The ramifications of this tortured decision are breath-taking and without any historic or legitimate Constitutional rationale," said the pastors' organization. "For the court to state that if a private citizen exercises his or her First Amendment rights of religious expression and assembly on public property, that any monument, building or fixed item of any kind that contains religious references becomes 'establishment of religion' is simply irrational."
The conclusion, if applied nationwide, would result in the sandblasting of hundreds of monuments and buildings "including the capstone on the Washington Monument, which reads, 'Laus Deo,' or 'Praise be to God,'" the pastors group continued.
"For this panel majority of two justices to claim that words and actions by private citizens or elected officials with religious content, expressed about a building or monument, convert it from 'secular' and constitutional to 'sacred' and unconstitutional amounts to an act of blatant judicial activism against the freedoms and Constitution," the HAPC said.
The group Battle For The Bible also is working on the case, and Welch said there are experts on constitutional law who have been and plan to continue assisting the county in its fight over the representation of the Bible.
"They are of the opinion this needs to be appealed directly to the Supreme Court, and we're working on that right now," Welch told WND.
He called the logic "twisted" that could conclude the monument once was constitutional, but since "some action by a private citizen" it now becomes unconstitutional.
Because the atheist's lawsuit was against the county over the monument on county land, the pastors and their advisors have been assisting County Attorney Michael Stafford in the fight.
ON THE HOME FRONT
Muslims team up with Marxists for D.C. protest
Massive 'emergency' rally on 'predicament' of Islamic people abroad and at home'
A radical anti-war coalition is joining forces with a U.S. Islamic lobby organization to stage a demonstration in front of the White House to protest "the current predicament of Muslims abroad and at home."
A.N.S.W.E.R., a coalition led by socialist and communist activists, and Muslim American Society's Freedom Foundation are co-sponsoring the "National Emergency March" Aug. 12 at Lafayette Park at 12 noon.
A third co-sponsor is the National Council of Arab Americans.
A number of leaders for A.N.S.W.E.R. – Act Now to Stop War and End Racism – were members of the Workers World Party and now belong to the Party for Socialism and Liberation , a Marxist-Leninist organization founded in 2004
Along with the "plight of the Palestinian people and the recent atrocities in Gaza and Lebanon," the Muslim group says it will focus on the war in Iraq and "the continuous violation of civil rights and civil liberties within the American Muslim community."
The Muslim American Society, or MAS, says it's sponsoring buses to transport people from outside the Washington area.
In Detroit, which has one of the country's largest Muslim communities, 25 buses already have been arranged for the event.
The Freedom Foundation is the public affairs arm of the Muslim American Society, which calls itself the largest grassroots Muslim organization in the country, with more than 50 chapters nationwide.
As WorldNetDaily reported, the Muslim American Society held a rally last month during which a Jewish activist was physically assaulted and threatened.
The event at Boston's City Hall Plaza was the group's "Justice for Palestine and Lebanon Protest." Signs brought by participants included some including some calling for "victory" for the terrorist group Hezbollah and the "Palestinian Resistance."
In a WND interview, the group's executive director, Mahdi Bray, blamed the United States and President Bush for the war between Hezbollah and Israel.
Bray said that while there are "no clean hands" in the escalating violence, the United States has failed completely.
"We have the … capability of doing something," he said. "Our position is not defensible that we have not used our leverage to obtain a cease-fire."
FAITH UNDER FIRE
House-church leader
gets 7-1/2 years in prison
Family members concerned over prominent
Chinese pastor's health
A prominent Chinese house movement leader, Pastor Zhang Rongliang, has been sentenced to seven-and-a- half years in prison.
According to China Aid Association, the July 4 verdict was issued by Zhongmu County People's Court, though CAA reported that neither Zhang's wife nor other members of his immediate family received a formal notification. Zhang was arrested Dec. 1, 2004.
The China Aid Association was told by one of its sources that Zhang, 55, was arrested at Xuzhai village, Zhengzhou city, Henan province in a rented apartment. The apartment was searched and all of Zhang's Christian DVDs, materials and photos revealing relationships with foreigners and foreign agencies were confiscated.
Zhang's wife and their two sons have been deeply concerned for his welfare and safety, especially as he has suffered from serious diabetes for seven years. His disease was so serious that he was admitted to the Xinmi City People's Hospital while at his detention center from Dec. 19, 2005, until Jan. 23, 2006, for emergency treatment. He was seen handcuffed and chained to his hospital bed while there.
The popular Christian pastor was charged with "attaining a passport through cheating" and with "illegal border crossing" for his international traveling including to the U.S., Australia, Egypt and Singapore for world mission conferences.
Zhang is the leader of the Fangcheng Mother Church, Henan, and the leader of the China for Christ Church, which is one of the largest house-church networks estimated to have more than 10 million members. He has been well known by the international community, CAA stated, as one of the house-church patriarchs.
He is a co-author of the book "House Churches of China's Confession of Faith and Declaration" in 1999. He has been featured in a number of international articles and books, including "Jesus in Beijing" (2003) by former Time magazine writer David Aikman, Newsweek (May 12, 2004), Charisma and Christianity Today. Last year, the European Parliament passed a resolution demanding Zhang's release.
Zhang has been wanted for many years since his last imprisonment in August 1999. He has already spent 12 years in prison for his faith since his secret baptism in 1969 during five separate detentions. CAA reported that he has experienced extreme torture, including electric shocks, during his prison terms.
Bob Fu, who is the president of China Aid and personally knows Zhang and his family, said in a news release: "We are deeply disappointed for this extraordinary harsh verdict given the fact that the Chinese authorities often deny passports and other travel documents to well-known religious leaders like Pastor Zhang."
He added, "This is yet another case showing the Chinese government's new tactic of religious persecution in the name of criminal charges."
Editor's note: Those wanting to assist Pastor
Zhang can contact: Embassy of the People's Republic of China, 2300
Connecticut Ave NW., Washington, D.C. 20008. Tel: (202) 328-2500, Fax:
(202) 588-0032, or the director of religious affairs: (202) 328-2512.
Does anyone own property any more?
It's getting to the point in America when it just doesn't pay to own property any more.
The latest eminent-domain nightmare in New Jersey illustrates that no matter how long an American lives and works and pays taxes on his real estate, it can be taken away by the government for many reasons or no good reason at all.
Larry and Clara Halper first learned of the town's interest in their 75-acre farm about seven years ago, when officials held a press conference across the street from their property, announcing to the whole world that they were buying it to maintain open space in the increasingly developed area.
Imagine what that does to property values!
No one had consulted with the Halpers on a price or even asked if they were interested in selling – which they were not.
That began a series of court battles – all of which were lost by the property owners. Finally, the New Jersey Supreme Court refused to overturn lower court rulings demanding the Halpers hand over their property. Now they are just awaiting the arrival of the sheriff with eviction orders.
"The whole system has disappointed us," said Clara Halper. "These people have really overturned our government. I'm sorry, this is not the American government the way I was brought up. People call it the politics of corruption. Call it whatever you want to – it's stealing."
The whole ordeal is like a sick joke. The Halpers, preferring the simple life they have known all their lives, living and working on the small farm, have no interest in moving. They have no interest in starting over. They like the life they have built for themselves on a property first purchased by Larry Halper's grandfather in 1922.
If the town of Piscataway truly wants to ensure that it has some open space, what better way than to leave the Halpers alone. The Halpers have no plans to do anything with their farmland but raise pumpkins for sale each fall and fresh vegetables for local residents who prefer homegrown produce.
But owning land doesn't mean what it once meant in America.
So, to permit the massive development of other parcels of open land in the town, officials are seizing the Halpers' land. But there are no guarantees they will keep the land open. The agreement the town forced upon the Halpers clearly states that officials can do whatever they choose to do with the land in the future.
Imagine seizing the home and business of law-abiding Americans even when there are no clear plans for the property. That's what is happening in Piscataway.
And where can this American couple turn now? Can they fight this all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court, knowing the court has already ruled that governments have an absolute right to seize property from homeowners even if it is solely to squeeze more tax revenue out of the real estate?
Is this what our founders fought off a colonial power to leave us?
Is this what our sons, brothers, fathers, grandfathers and great-grandfathers sacrificed and died in foreign wars to bring us?
Is this what the U.S. Constitution and Declaration of Independence mean in 2006?
Where are we to turn for relief?
Are we truly the freest people in the world any more when we are all subject to this kind of tyranny?
And make no mistake about it. If this can happen to the Halpers, it can happen to any of us. Americans are no longer a self-governing sovereign people who shape their own destiny. We are all subjects. We are all serfs. We are not safe and secure in our homes and businesses. We are all simply awaiting that knock on the door.
Let the executions begin
On June 29, the United States Supreme Court, in its usual weird wisdom, cleared the way for the execution of 14 detainees that were to be brought before a tribunal for their links to terrorists and terrorist acts. In the 5-3 decision and a stroke of the pen, the justices found, in essence, that the detainees have the rights afforded normal signatories to the Geneva Conventions, and that is just fine with me. May the executions begin today? Before you think I have lost my mind, let me explain.
The court ruled that the plan to use tribunals, in the case of Salim Hamdan, is a violation of the U.S. Military Code of Justice and the Geneva Conventions in dealing with detainees. Hamdan, currently detained at Gitmo, is accused of delivering weapons to al-Qaida and being a guard for Osama bin Laden. Now that the court sees Hamdan and apparently the other detainees as "prisoners of war" under the Geneva Conventions, they should be afforded all the conditions of the Geneva Conventions – not just the current provisions such as clean rooms, special dietary meals and free religious practices.
If you've never read the Geneva Conventions, I suggest you do so. It is a fascinating document. Henri Dunant, the founder of the Red Cross, inspired the Conventions in 1864. It went through additions in 1929 and 1949. In 1949, the Geneva Conventions extended protections to those shipwrecked at sea and civilians. It is the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 that are most referred to when dealing with modern day conflicts.
There is an article in Geneva Conventions IV that should be applied immediately given the Supreme Court ruling. I see it only fair now that the detainees have all the provisions of the Conventions afforded them that we not fall into the trap of picking and choosing which ones apply. All or none.
Here is the article direct from the Conventions that needs immediate attention:
Article 68. Protected persons who commit an offense which is solely intended to harm the Occupying Power, but which does not constitute an attempt on the life or limb of members of the occupying forces or administration, nor a grave collective danger, nor seriously damage the property of the occupying forces or administration or the installations used by them, shall be liable to internment or simple imprisonment, provided the duration of such internment or imprisonment is proportionate to the offense committed. Furthermore, internment or imprisonment shall, for such offenses, be the only measure adopted for depriving protected persons of liberty. The courts provided for under Article 66 of the present Convention may at their discretion convert a sentence of imprisonment to one of internment for the same period.The penal provisions promulgated by the Occupying Power in accordance with Articles 64 and 65 may impose the death penalty against a protected person only in cases where the person is guilty of espionage, of serious acts of sabotage against the military installations of the Occupying Power or of intentional offenses which have caused the death of one or more persons, provided that such offenses were punishable by death under the law of the occupied territory in force before the occupation began.
The death penalty may not be pronounced against a protected person unless the attention of the court has been particularly called to the fact that since the accused is not a national of the Occupying Power, he is not bound to it by any duty of allegiance. In any case, the death penalty may not be pronounced on a protected person who was under 18 years of age at the time of the offense.
So, what is the issue? It is clear as a bell from what I read. The penalty for any "protected person" (i.e., Salim Hamdan), according to the Supreme Court, that is guilty of espionage or sabotage against military installations of the occupying forces (that is U.S. and Coalition forces for my Berkeley readers) is death. Not a clean room, fresh clothing and lamb and rice three times a week. They should receive a date with the hangman's noose.
This holds true for the 14 other detainees the Bush administration wished to place before a tribunal. I'm not a lawyer but I do have a bit of common sense. The way I read the ruling and the Geneva Conventions, the justices of the Supreme Court just signed these guys' death warrants. Hallelujah! There may have been great wisdom on behalf of the administration to agree to this insane ruling. It clears the way for this human garbage to get a one-way ticket to Allah tonight. That is if the administration has the stomach to put up with the whining that will come from the left. Man, do they hate this president.
I would encourage our president to abide by the ruling and announce he will sign the order to proceed with the executions. This will allow the legal scholars at the New York Times and CNBC to debate, attack and attempt to find all the loopholes so that one of their heroes (Hamdan) won't face the executioner. No, that would appear too much like justice.
I can hear the spirit of Tookie screaming from the flames as I write. Hamdan and Tookie. Now that makes a great pair of modern-day deities for the libs to worship. Why, to make a person like Tookie or Hamdan pay for the crimes they committed would not be fair. After all, we Americans brought it on ourselves. It is our fault that Islamic terrorists are killing thousands of innocent people daily and attacking the "occupiers" with car bombs and 747s into tall buildings. All they are doing is fighting the imperialists. I'm so sick of hearing that line of reasoning I could scream. John Kerry and Cindy Sheehan believe we are the terrorists, not al-Qaida. They claim George Bush is a far greater threat then Osama. Heck, Cindy believes Bush is a "bigger" terrorist than OBL. He killed her son after all. The son she didn't even raise.
Fact is we are at war. We have an enemy and the time has long passed for us to coddle and offer "rights" to bloodthirsty animals that kill and maim innocent people as a way of life and religious calling. We need to listen to the Geneva Conventions and apply them immediately. The writers knew that those who would use sabotage and espionage would stop at nothing to achieve their goals and must be eliminated in any "humane" war. So let the executions begin, and I promise not to rejoice the way the Arab world did the day 3,000 innocent Americans were slaughtered at the hands of these animals. Time to appease and negotiate? No. Time to execute? YES! It is the law.
GLOBAL JIHAD
Al-Qaida: Destroy Denmark, France
Escaped member issues video urging
vengeance for Muhammad cartoons
 |
"Muslims avenge your prophet," said Libyan Muhammad Hassan, who escaped from U.S. custody in Afghanistan last July.
"We deeply desire that the small state of Denmark, Norway and France ... are struck hard and destroyed," he declared, according to Agence France-Presse.
Earlier this year, 12 cartoons depicting Muhammad published in Denmark's Jyllands-Posten newspaper became an international controversy, prompting the torching of embassies, slaughter of Christians and fatwas issued against those responsible.
In the 35-minute video, Hassan, dressed in military fatigues, is holding an assault rifle.
"Destroy their buildings, make their ground shake and transform them into a sea of blood," said Hassan, also known as Sheikh Abu Yahia al-Libi.
Hassan was one of four Arab terror suspects who broke out of the U.S.'s high-security detention facility at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan.
 |
Al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, in his most recent audio communiqué, aired on Al-Jazeera late last month, called for a global Muslim boycott of American goods similar to the recent boycott of Danish products. He also said the artists who drew the offending cartoons should be handed over to him for trial and punishment.
As Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin reported, a dozen young terrorists have departed Afghanistan, bound first for Iran and then Europe, where their mission will be to hunt down the Danish cartoonists.
The report was passed on by Hamid Mir, the Pakistani journalist who has interviewed bin Laden and assistant Ayman al-Zawahiri and who just visited the no-man's land along the border of Afghanistan and Pakistan.
While there, he was told by Taliban sources in south Waziristan that 12 young men – nine Afghans and three Pakistanis – are on their way to Europe to kill the Danish cartoonists. While some carry Afghan passports and others carry Iranian passports, all will travel through Iran on their way to Europe, he reports.
Days
before that television broadcast, Mir predicted an imminent
communiqué
from bin Laden to be released on the Arab television network.
Exposing
the Muslim lobby
Paul Sperry's
shoe-leather investigative journalism is showcased to its fullest in "Infiltration:
How Muslim Spies and Subversives Have Penetrated Washington,"
in which he sets out to prove that, for the past 30 years, the
burgeoning Muslim community's representatives in the United States
have been working clandestinely to undermine America's constitutional government and the Judeo-Christian ethics on which it was built ... Their goal, quite simply, is to replace the U.S. Constitution with the Quran, the Muslim sacred book, and turn America into an Islamic state.
Given the gravity of the claim, the prospective reader may rightly ask: Is this book just another conspiracy theory, akin to those who bang on about "Illuminati Jews From the Center of the Earth" and their manipulation of world affairs? Or has Sperry met his evidentiary obligations?
You bet he has. In fact, the mass of evidence Sperry provides is staggering. His findings are based on interviews with some two dozen law enforcement and intelligence officials from the FBI, the Departments of Homeland Security and Defense, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Customs and Border Protection, as well as local law enforcement – including the Fairfax County Police Department in Virginia, the heart of the Wahhabi corridor in America. Some of these sources are cited in the book, while others have requested anonymity for fear of reprisals from headquarters for speaking out on classified cases.
In addition to these sources, Sperry cites more than 50 sensitive internal government documents, some classified, and many posted on the book's companion website (sperryfiles.com). If the strength of ideas rests on their relationship to reality, then Sperry has struck a chord with the men in the trenches. Both the NYPD and the DOD have ordered copies of "Infiltration" for training field investigators charged with protecting U.S. military installations across the country. And after reading "Infiltration," one senior member of the federal National Counterterrorism Center in McLean, Va., who had investigated many of the key Saudi-connected cases along the Wahhabi corridor in the Washington suburbs, said: "Sperry has catalogued the last three years of our lives."
Sperry's most controversial claim is that the radical Islamist assault on the West is based not on some perverse interpretation of Islam, but is rooted in Islam itself. I happen to agree with him, while realizing that this point is subject to considerable debate. However, Sperry's unmasking of radical Islamist subversion in America does not hinge on whether the militants constitute Islam's fringe or its mainstream: Either way, the threat they pose is ominous enough.
The book begins by exposing the countless U.S. Muslim leaders who masquerade as moderates, forswear terrorism, but then do what the Quran commands: "instill terror in the hearts of unbelievers" (Surah 8:12). Embraced by American presidents, the likes of Sami Al-Arian, Abdurahman M. Alamoudi, and Muzammil H. Siddiqi – to name but a few – represent the creme de la creme of "moderate" Islam in America. Sperry traces the career trajectories of these (and other) faux moderates as they've gone from "the White House to the Big House": The first was tried for heading the U.S branch of Islamic Jihad; the second "pleaded guilty of plotting terrorist acts with Libya"; the third, president of the Fiqh Council of North America and the flower of the flock, has confined himself mercifully to merely cussing the United States.
Consider the "moderate" Council on American-Islamic Relations – the media-savvy mouthpiece for militant Islam in America. One CAIR leader, Omar M. Ahmad, is quoted as saying that "Islam isn't in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant. The Koran ... should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on earth." Says Ibrahim Hooper, another low-key chap from CAIR: "I want to see the U.S. become an Islamic nation." This "mainstream" Islamic group has seen three of its top leaders – Ghassan Elashi, Bassem K. Khafagi, and Randall Todd "Ismail" Royer – convicted on terrorism-related charges.
Even more dispiriting, we learn that there is nothing extraordinary about the characters whose unpleasant acquaintance we make. When addressing gullible Americans and their votes-vying leaders, too many of America's imams are "the picture of piety," observes Sperry. They talk a good game about Islam's devotion to peace and co-existence and they've offered (sham) sympathies for 9-11. However, while whispering sweet nothings in naïve American ears, in private and from their pulpits, revered religious pillars of the Muslim community have been caught advocating violence, advising their followers to work to impose the strict Islamic code of sharia in the U.S., and swearing allegiances to al-Qaida's capo di tutti capi.
Take imams Siraj Wahhaj and Muzammil H. Siddiqi as examples. In 1992, a year after Wahhaj gave the invocation to Congress, no less, he "suggested to a Muslim audience in New Jersey that Muslims had the numbers to take control of the United States in a political coup." For his part, Siddiqi was given the "solemn honor of representing the Muslim faith during the prayer service for [9-11] victims at the national Cathedral in Washington." This, apparently, did nothing to detract from his desire to consolidate a caliphate. In a 2003 fatwa, he reminded the faithful that "Allah's rules have to be established in all lands, and all our efforts lead to that direction." According to Sperry, such duplicity is in keeping with Taqiyya – the seldom-discussed Islamic practice of lying to non-Muslims in order to win political battles and protect Islam.
Thanks to multiculturalist efforts to appease the Islamist lobby, it has infiltrated deep into American society. A Muslim chaplain corps has been created in the U.S. military and a Saudi-based front for al-Qaida employed to minister to the approximately 20,000 Muslim soldiers. The same religious recruiters are active in penitentiaries, where there are 200,000 Muslim inmates. In fact, U.S. prisons are now the top recruiting ground for al-Qaida in the United States.
Then there are radical Islam's apologists in academia. Leading the pack is Professor John Esposito, director of the Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding at Georgetown University, who "argues American heritage can be more accurately defined as 'Judeo-Christian-Islamic.'" Esposito's well-funded, academically credentialed "interfaith phoniness," as Sperry puts it, has gone a long way toward mainstreaming Islam. By sheer fluke, of course, Esposito also "lionizes Palestinian terrorists as leaders of a political movement and the late PLO chief Yasir [sic] Arafat as a statesman. And he urges Washington to distance itself from Israel." Sperry traced Esposito's backers through IRS tax records, and – wouldn't you have guessed it? – Esposito is in the pay of a wealthy Palestinian who hates Israel.
Readers who don't have a dog in the interfaith rivalry will suppress a yawn as our deeply religious author attempts to show that Muslims do not worship the same God as Christians and Jews do – they do not believe Jesus is the son of God. I realize Sperry doesn't write to please the unfaithful. Still, he might have placed a greater emphasis on philosophical rather than theological one-upmanship and juxtaposed the significant ethical and philosophical differences between the Judeo-Christian and the Islamic traditions. For example: universal concepts of justice vs. ruthless particularism; the sanctity and rights of all human beings vs. dominance for some and dhimmitude for others, etc.
Courtesy of an administration that has anesthetized Americans to the essential Islam (and thus continued its predecessor's multicultural mission), Muslims with ominous beliefs and agendas have managed to infiltrate every security agency, from the FBI to the Pentagon. Sperry warns that the FBI, freighted by anti-discrimination laws and pathological political correctness, now harbors Muslim translators with ties to "various foreign military and intelligence agencies in Syria, Egypt, Pakistan, and Turkey." (Could this help explain why urgent intercepts are often left untranslated or are mistranslated?) Easily the most scandalous anecdote in the book is that of FBI agent Sibel Edmonds walking into the Washington field office after 9-11, to find the Middle Eastern linguists making merry – passing around date-stuffed cookies to celebrate the occasion on which America got its just deserts. Were they fired? Stripped of their top-secret security clearances? Au contraire! More of their ilk were hired. Meanwhile, Arabic-speaking Sephardic Jews have been rejected for the job. There were "loyalty concerns," or so the bureau said.
Subversive Muslims and Arabs have also received top-secret clearances at the Homeland Security Department and even the White House, where, according to Sperry, they've "successfully run influence operations against our political system with the help of both Democrats and Republicans, not least in order to badger corporate boards into Islamizing the work place."
So to the big question: What role does Islam itself play in this subversive effort? Sperry has read the CAIR-approved translation of the Quran, as well as the hadiths ("sacred supplements to the Quran"), and concludes – as have scholars such as Robert Spencer (author of "The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam" (and the Crusades)) and Serge Trifkovic (of "The Sword of the Prophet" fame) – that "sadly, much of Western terrorism is simply Islam in practice, the text of the Quran in action." Judging by the Quran, Islam is "an inherently violent and intolerant faith," around which a politically correct mythology has been molded.
Osama has heeded, not hijacked, Islam.
In the event that doubts linger, "Infiltration's," "Top 10 Myths Of Islam" blows an even bigger hole in the heart of the Religion-of-Peace fable. Terrorism is an excrescence of Islam, Sperry argues, because while the murder of "innocents" might be prohibited, "orthodox Muslims do not consider Jews and Christians [much less Israeli civilians] necessarily innocent." In other words, "What the public recognizes as murder, these Muslims recognize as justice." The Quran, after all, doesn't teach tolerance toward other faiths, but inveighs against the Jewish "apes and swine" and the Christian blasphemers. Sperry backs his debunking by quoting copiously from the Quran. Here a word about Quranic literalism might have been instructive. Unlike the Jewish and Christian holy texts, which have been reinterpreted by the sages over the centuries, Islam has changed little in 1,400 years – its decrees are not debatable and are taken very literally.
Well, then, what of moderate Muslim leaders and interpreters? Hasn't Sperry given short shrift to the many who promote a more benign version of Islam? The Muslim community, he observes, is divided into Shiites, Sunnis, and more moderate Sufis. The reformers and the moderates come from the ranks of the Shiite and Sufi, but are
not considered part of the established Muslim leadership in America, and have only minor voices in the national debate. Why? Mainly because the vast majority of mosques in America practice Sunnism, Islam's main sect, and as many as eight out of 10 are under Saudi Wahhabi control.
The extent to which the community's Wahhabi-dominated organizations coordinate their schemes is revealed in a chapter titled "The Muslim Mafia." Practically all Muslim groups in America are united under the umbrella of the American Muslim Political Coordinated Council, whose goal, in Sperry's words, is "rolling back U.S. support for Israel and weakening U.S. anti-terrorism laws." A CIA internal report that Sperry references reveals that "at least one-third of the fifty Islamic nongovernmental organizations in existence 'support terrorist groups or employ individuals who are suspected of having terrorist connections.'"
Further FBI investigations have unveiled organizations with "interlocking boards of directors," and an elaborate maze of shell companies and fronts – religious charities and think tanks included – set up to launder terrorist-bound funds. The Holy Land Foundation, a facade for Hamas (recently catapulted into government power by the Palestinians) has since become a synonym for terrorism. Many of these groups' leaders are under indictment, having pled guilty to ties to terrorists. Again, Sperry emphasizes that these leaders and their syndicates are not fringe elements, skulking on the outskirts of the American Islamic community, but are among "the best the Muslim community has to offer."
So what is to be done? The book's Afterword offers pragmatic recommendations that Sperry – a bare-knuckled but beguiling writer – prefaces with a call for us to better understand the nature of the threat:
America is a beautiful, fun, and vibrant place. Its people are friendly and hospitable. Why didn't any of the hijackers have second thoughts? Why didn't they say, 'You know, this place isn't so bad after all. Osama can go pound sand up his nightgown; we're gonna chill here for a while'?
The short answer is a toxic yet intoxicating trinity: Allah, the Quran, and the Pearly Gates that beckon. Yet Washington refuses to grapple with the enemy's inspirations and motives. Our ostensible protectors have not even read, let along understood, the founding document that fuels jihad. Coming to terms with the true Islam and with what drives its foot soldiers is imperative, insists Sperry.
Other more concrete recommendations include investing in mastering Arabic and cracking down on terrorism-supporting charities. The least promising of Sperry's recommendations is the enforcement of the oath of allegiance. Given what our author has told us about deception vis-a-vis Taqiyya, it's naive to hope that prohibiting dual citizenship and enforcing an oath will dissolve the pledge of allegiance to Islam and the greater Ummah.
Then there's the issue of "profiling." Next time you shake in your socks on an American airplane as Middle Eastern men on a suspected dry run strut up and down the isles unhindered, duck into toilets with cell phones and cameras, flout flight rules, and intimidate terrified travelers with menacing gestures, thank the Muslim lobby groups for the experience. (This incident actually occurred last year on a Northwest Airlines flight.) However, you owe deeper gratitude to our elected representatives for legally prohibiting commonsense profiling and other "minimally observant" screening safeguards.
After all, Muslim identity groups are not paid to protect Americans – the government is. Yet it appears stone deaf to our fate, while all ears to the bellyaching of resentful Muslim advocacy groups. Sperry, our epistolary Jack Bauer, exposes many former and present government officials, such as the FBI's Robert Mueller, the CIA's George Tenet, and Transportation's Norman Mineta – all of whom opted for multicultural outreach and sensitivity training to the detriment of counterterrorism and counterintelligence. Considering the severity of their transgressions – and the stakes – the words "gullible" and "politically correct" do not begin to describe their dereliction.
In
the final analysis, Sperry's book constitutes a withering indictment of
an administration that has not only failed in its constitutional duty
to uproot America's enemies on the home front, but has done its best to
accommodate and appease them.
FROM WND'S
JERUSALEM BUREAU
'We're on the eve of World War III'
Ex-Mossad chief urges West to unite,
warns of Muslims imposing ideology
JERUSALEM � Global civilization is on the verge of "World War III," a massive conflict in which the Islamic world will attempt to impose its ideology on Western nations, according to Meir Amit, a former director of Israel's Mossad intelligence agency.
Amit, one of the most esteemed figures in the international defense establishment, warned Islamic nations and global Islamist groups will continue launching "all kinds of attacks" against Western states. He urged the international community to immediately unite and coordinate a strategy to fight against the "Islamic war."
"We are on the eve of war with the Islamic world, which will wage a war and all kinds of actions and attacks against the Western world. We already noticed the terrorists in the world hit Spain, England, France. I call it World War III. You must look at it from this angle and treat it wider, not as a problem of terrorism here and there," said Amit, speaking during an exclusive interview with WND's Aaron Klein and ABC Radio's John Batchelor broadcast on Batchelor's national program, for which Klein serves as a co-host. (Listen to the Amit interview.)
Amit served as Mossad chief from 1963 to 1968. He directed some of the most notorious Mossad operations during that time and pioneered many of the tactics currently used by intelligence agencies worldwide. The subject of multiple books and movies, Amit is routinely described as a "living legend." Now in his mid-80s, Amit serves as chairman of Israel's Center for Special Studies.
The former intelligence chief referenced recent terror attacks against Israel, Europe and the United States; Iran's alleged nuclear ambitions; the insurgency in Iraq and Afghanistan; and worldwide Muslim riots.
"It looks to me like it is a kind of coordinated or contemplated problem to somehow impose the Islamic idea all over the world," Amit said.
Israel is routinely attacked by Palestinian terror groups. Since December 2000, 993 Israelis have been killed. Spain in March 2004 was struck by a series of coordinated bombings on its commuter train system, killing 192 people. London was rocked last July by bombings on its transportation system. France has been the scene of violent Muslim riots and attacks. And on Sept. 11, 2001, 2,986 people were killed when the U.S. was hit with coordinated terror attacks.
Violent Muslim riots erupted last month in the West Bank, Syria and Lebanon after cartoon images of Muhammad were printed in a Danish newspaper. The riots spread across the Middle East and throughout Europe.
At least 40 people were killed yesterday in a blast north of Mosul in Iraq. Iran and Syria have been accused of aiding the insurgency there and in Afghanistan against U.S. and European troops.
Amit urged Western nations to "unite and work together. Unfortunately, the world is not uniting. China and Russia are problems. This should be taken into consideration."
Both China and Russia have been aiding Iran's nuclear program, which Tehran claims is intended for peaceful purposes only. Russia last month received a delegation of Hamas leaders, and pledged to maintain diplomatic relations with the terror group in spite of efforts by the U.S. and Israel to isolate the newly elected Hamas-led Palestinian government.
Amit said Iran currently poses the most serious threat to the international community.
"The Iranians [are] financing terrorists in Israel and sending money," Amit said. "This is [my country's] immediate problem. But I think the most serious problem is Iran developing nuclear power."
Amit said Israel should not lead a military attack against Iran's suspected nuclear facilities, instead urging support for the course of diplomacy and sanctions.
"The problem of [Iranian] nuclear armaments is not an Israeli problem; it is a worldwide problem. Your question refers to what Israel can do. It shouldn't do anything by itself. It should maybe throw the idea that this is a world problem and all the Western world should unite, join hands and work together," said Amit.
"I am not sure whether a military operation would be the best solution. At least not the first solution. But you can put sanctions on Iran."
With regard to his warnings of a new world war, Amit clarified he was not advocating the international community take measures against all Arab countries:
"I know very well the Arab world. I have many friends in Arab world leaders. Not all of them think the same. They are also split in different groups. ... Although I think they will wage an Islamic war against the Western world, we must take into account they are not one piece. Somehow we must learn the differences between different sections and parts of the Arab world."
FAITH UNDER FIRE
Man
faces death penalty
for becoming Christian
Despite ouster of Taliban by U.S., court
still prosecutes ex-Muslim
Despite the fact the hardline Taliban regime is no longer in power, an Afghan man faces possible execution for allegedly abandoning his Islamic roots and becoming a Christian.
"Yes that's true, a man has converted to Christianity. He's being tried in one of our courts," Supreme Court judge Ansarullah Mawlavizada told the Middle East Times.
The case centers on Abdul Rahman, believed to be 41, who converted from Islam to Christianity some 16 years ago. His relatives reportedly notified authorities about the conversion.
The constitution in Afghanistan is based on Shariah law, which states any Muslim who rejects his or her religion should be sentenced to death.
"We are not against any particular religion in the world. But in Afghanistan, this sort of thing is against the law," the judge told the Associated Press. "It is an attack on Islam. ... The prosecutor is asking for the death penalty."
If he indeed is sentenced, Rahman would be the first person punished for leaving Islam since the Taliban was ousted by American-led forces in late 2001, in the wake of the Sept. 11 terror attacks on the U.S.
Prosecutor Abdul Wasi says he offered to drop the charges if Rahman made the switch back to Islam, but the defendant is maintaining his Christian beliefs. The judge is expected to rule within two months.
About
99 percent of Afghanistan's 28 million people are Muslims, with the
rest mostly Hindus.
Other
related articles from other sources:
On June 2 and 3, Canadian law enforcement in Toronto arrested 17 Muslim men for planning terrorist attacks on Canadian targets. The leader of the group, Qayyum Abdul Jamal, 43, recruited young Muslim males by speaking at Al-Rahman Islamic Center for Islamic Education, a storefront mosque in Mississauga. Law enforcement officials across the globe are searching for suspects connected to the Toronto 17; American law enforcement has already discovered at least two terrorism suspects who spoke with members of the Canadian terrorist cell.
In May 2004, London authorities arrested hook-handed, one-eyed imam Abu Hamza al-Masri. The United States immediately filed charges against al-Masri and asked that Britain expedite him for trial. Among other terrorist acts, the indictment charged al-Masri with attempting to set up a terrorist cell in Oregon. Al-Masri was also linked to terrorists Zacarias Moussaoui, who was involved in the Sept. 11 plot, and Richard Reid (a.k.a. Tariq Raja and Abdul Rahim), the shoebomber. Al-Masri was the imam of the Finsbury Park Mosque in London, where he used his pulpit to recruit terrorists and preach hate.
In September 2002, American law enforcement arrested six members of a larger terrorist cell in Buffalo, N.Y. All six were young Muslim men, and all six had attended terrorist training in Afghanistan. The leader of the group, Kamal Derwish, had recruited all the arrested members by speaking at his local mosque in Lackawanna. All six men pled guilty to terrorism charges.
Mohamed Atta, one of the Sept. 11 hijackers, used a mosque in Hamburg, Germany, to network with potential recruits, including Ramzi Binalshibh, who would act as a coordinator for the attacks. Two of the potential Sept. 11 terrorists, Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Mihdhar, hooked up with an imam at Rabat Mosque, Anwar Aulaqi; Aulaqi would later aid al-Hazmi and Mihdhar's replacement, Hani Hanjour, in relocating east as Sept. 11 approached.
Mosques across the globe have provided material aid to terrorist groups ranging from al-Qaida to Islamic Jihad to Hezbollah to Hamas. Muslim terrorists use mosques as networking sites and often as recruitment centers for future terrorist comrades. There is no doubt that law enforcement should be heavily scrutinizing the membership and administration of mosques. Doing so before Sept. 11 could have prevented that catastrophe, just as scrutiny of a small, seemingly insignificant storefront mosque may have prevented major terrorist attacks in Canada. Muslim terrorists are, above all, religious. They will attend mosques, even if only to pray. Forget racial profiling – monitoring mosques is simple common sense.
Leaders in the Muslim community don't seem to get it. "People are suspicious and there's anger," complains Aly Hindy, imam at the Toronto-based Salaheddin Islamic Center in Scarborough. "We are being targeted not because of what we've done, but because of who we are and what we believe in."
No
doubt this is true to some extent. But that is the difference between
prevention of crime and after-the-fact investigation of crime. For
attempts to remain attempts, suspects must be stopped in the inchoate
processes leading up to attacks. Prevention is undoubtedly the only
option if civilized nations wish to preserve their citizenries from the
sadistic barbarism of our enemies. Monitoring mosques is the simplest
and most effective way of preventing terrorist attacks. Many imams are
trustworthy; many mosques are clean. Nonetheless, law enforcement must
pursue a strategy of "trust, but verify." Lives depend on it.
June
2006 Creators Syndicate Inc.
A Defeat for Islamism in America
Rubinstein: Thanks, Jamie. It is a real
pleasure to be here.
FP: First, tell us briefly what this
libel suit was about.
Rubinstein:
CAIR filed suit against Andrew Whitehead, claiming Mr. Whitehead’s
statements on the Anti-CAIR website (www.anti-cair-net.org) were false
and defamatory. The main statements were that CAIR is a terrorist
supporting front organization, that CAIR was founded by Hamas
supporters seeking to overthrow Constitutional government in the
FP: CAIR clearly had something to hide
by not wanting to open up its records right?
Rubinstein:
Well, I think that this is one conclusion that could be fairly drawn.
It would be logical to assume CAIR did not want to expose its finances,
its connections to foreign interests, and possibly the beliefs and
intentions of its key leadership to legal process. My guess, based on
the information we obtained during this case from a variety of sources,
is that CAIR may have been most concerned about protecting its funding
sources and its foreign backers. In truth, its leadership has been
pretty open about ideology and goals.
FP: Tell us some people that have been
found to be connected to CAIR.
Rubinstein:
As stated in papers filed with the court, CAIR has been connected to
the Islamic Association of Palestine (which has been held civilly
liable for the Hamas murder of an American teenager), convicted Hamas
financier Ghashan Elashi, Saudi interests, and radical groups, among
others. The court papers state:
*CAIR is connected to Musa Abu Marzook ("Marzook"), a key
Hamas operative. Marzook was named a terrorist and deported from the
*CAIR is connected to Ghassan Elashi, a founder both of
CAIR’s
*CAIR
is connected to a variety of foreign funding sources, primarily Saudis.
For example, a press release from the Saudi Arabian embassy in
*CAIR is connected to the World Assembly of Muslim Youth
(WAMY). In December 1999, WAMY announced at a press conference in
*CAIR
is connected to the International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT),
which gave CAIR $14,000 in 2003. IIIT is part of an interwoven group of
terror-financing conduits that sent money to, among others, Islamic
Jihad leader Sami Al-Arian.
*CAIR
is connected to the IAP, a radical Islamic organization that preached
the inevitability of conflict between “divinely inspired” Islamic
civilization and the materialistic, God-less West. Its website stated
there “is a civilizational conflict waged between, on the one land
(sic) Islamic civilization with its divinely inspired laws and mission
to create on this earth the society of justice and freedom which has
been ordained by God; and on the other hand, Western civilization with
its materialistic culture, worship of ethnicity and the state, and
denial of God’s supremacy."
*CAIR Founder and Executive Director Awad was IAP’s
public relations director. He complained to the
*CAIR
Founder and Board Chairman Ahmad, also a former IAP official, was heard
on FBI surveillance tapes of Hamas meetings in the
*Mohammed
Nimer, a CAIR official, was on the board of the United Association for
Studies and Research, a Hamas front founded by Marzook.
*Doug
AKA “Ibrahim” Hooper (“Hooper”), CAIR’s director of Communications,
also worked for the IAP before joining CAIR. He has said, “I wouldn’t
want to create the impression that I wouldn’t like the government of
the
*Ihsan
Bagby, a CAIR board member, has written Moslems “can never be full
citizens” of the United States “because there is no way we can be fully
committed to the institutions and ideologies of this country” as the
United States is not a Moslem country.
*Randall
(“Ismail”) Royer, CAIR’s communications specialist and civil rights
coordinator, is serving a 20-year prison term, having pled guilty after
being charged with conspiring to help Al Qaida and the Taliban kill
Americans in
*Bassem
Khafagi, CAIR’s community relations director, pled guilty in September
2003 to lying on his visa application and passing bad checks, and was
deported. Khafagi was also a founding member and president of the
Islamic Assembly of North America (IANA), a radical organization under
federal investigation for terror-related activities.
*Rabih Haddad, a CAIR fundraiser, was arrested on
terror-related charges and deported from the
*Siraj
Wahaj, a CAIR advisory board member, is a former member of the Nation
of Islam (NOI) who supports polygamy and full implementation of Islamic
law in the
FP:
Let's talk about the importance of this libel suit to free speech. CAIR
has used the courts as a tactic to stifle criticism of the Islamist
threat to
Rubinstein: The Whitehead case has
counteracted the tactic of using
FP: What are some lessons learned from
this case?
Rubinstein: Lessons learned include:
1)
As Justice Brandeis once said, the sunlight of public disclosure is the
best disinfectant. For example, in its responses to our discovery
requests, CAIR refused to admit Hamas murders innocent civilians. Now,
we uncovered evidence – all of it in the public record, by the way –
showing CAIR’s relationship with Hamas and its supporting entities. But
if anyone still had questions regarding CAIR’s true views on this
matter, this answer should put all doubts to rest.
2)
CAIR avoids critical scrutiny, and its leaders are especially
thin-skinned. To me, these traits suggest CAIR is vulnerable. It’s
important to remember that parties who resort to using lawsuits as a
substitute for open debate generally do so for two reasons: First, they
have the money to do so, and second, they recognize they can’t win a
fair exchange of ideas. CAIR apparently had the economic resources
available to support its litigation campaign. But I can only speculate
why CAIR tried to silence Mr. Whitehead. My sense is that every time a
CAIR official appears on television, more of the truth seeps out, and
CAIR alienates more and more Americans. In fact, I believe that if the
mainstream media subjected CAIR to a fraction of the scrutiny given to
the Duke Lacrosse team case, CAIR would be totally discredited.
3)
More needs to be done to expose and make public CAIR’s funding sources
and financial practices. There are stories in the Arab press on CAIR’s
foreign donors. Why these articles have not been printed in the
4) Don’t back down. Ever. CAIR’s only hope of success is if
Americans fail to stand up for what makes this country great.
FP:
The record clearly shows that CAIR does have extensive and significant
ties to Saudi funding sources, that it does promote fundamentalist
Islam, and that it does promote and advocate the termination of the
State of Israel. Now the worry is: does CAIR genuinely reflect the
views of Muslims in the
Rubinstein:
I believe CAIR most assuredly does not speak for all Muslims, for I
know there are American Muslims who oppose the policies of CAIR’s
current leadership. Nevertheless, I have come to the conclusion that
the world view of CAIR’s current leaders – at least the one I found
reflected in over a decade’s worth of public statements and activities
– has traction among key Muslim elites (e.g. clerics and community
activists) who have come to this country from the Mid-East, Pakistan,
Malaysia, and India, and among certain Muslim converts. As I went
through CAIR’s paper and Internet trail back to approximately 1994, it
seemed to me CAIR’s world view, its “meta-message” as it were, can be
broken down into three key themes. The first is terrible fear. It seems
from reading their material that Islam is under intense assault. The
second is triumphalist confidence. It seemed to me that the authors of
CAIR’s e-mail alerts and website texts and written reports believe that
Mohamed said that Islam is the only true faith, so Muslim control and
domination are eventually assured. The third is that Jews and Zionists
are apparently a source of and explanation for Muslim problems and
failures. The conclusion seems to be Muslims will reap the benefits if
Jewish “power” is reduced.
The
reason I think this world view has traction among many Mid-Eastern and
South Asian Muslim elites, is that I saw these same themes reappear
over and over again on a variety of Muslim websites, that I explored,
and in many mosque sermons and Islamic publications that I read. In the
course of defending Mr. Whitehead, we engaged in a great deal of
wide-ranging research, and I must tell you that I found entering the
Islamic Internet world was like walking through a sewer. The contempt
and intolerance for difference and dissent (even by other Muslims) is
shocking. Anti-Americanism and disdain for Western civilization is a
given. The oppression of women seems to be a basic cultural norm. And,
of course, raw, eliminationist anti-Semitism is ubiquitous. Frankly,
the obsessive fixation on Jews, Jewish control of the
FP: Reed
Rubinstein, thank you for joining us today.
Rubinstein: Thank you, Jamie. FrontPage's work is
critically important, and most appreciated.
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In the e-mail, Wichman gave his opinion of a protest led by the MSA. The e-mail read, in part:
Dear Moslem Association:
As a professor of Mechanical Engineering here at MSU I intened to protest your protest. I am offended not by cartoons, but by more mundane things like beheadings of civilians, cowardly attacks on public buildings, suicide murders, murders of Catholic priests (the latest in Turkey!), burnings of Christian chirches, the continued persecution of Coptic Christians in Egypt, the imposition of Sharia law on non-Muslims, the rapes of Scandinavain girls and women (called "whores" in your culture), the murder of film directors in Holland, and the rioting and looting in Paris France.
Professor Wichman later explained: "I used strong language in a private communication that I would certainly not have used if this communication would have gone public."
But this failed to satisfy the leaders of the MSA. They wanted blood in the form of a letter of reprimand; diversity training for faculty; and a mandatory freshman seminar on hate and discrimination.
The Michigan chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations had to get its shot at Wichman in as well. Executive director, Dawud Walid, had this to say: "It was upsetting, yet sad…it's scary when you think about the power that this gentleman has." Walid then added that the university should denounce the e-mail, conduct a formal investigation, and, of course, conduct "sensitivity training" on how to deal with Muslims on campus.
However, before the MSA demands anything, let’s look at some of its history.
- In 2003, the MSA of Penn State invited the chairman of a racist and anti-Semitic organization, the Populist Party, to speak at events celebrating "Islam Awareness Week".
- In 2002, during a protest in front of the Israeli consulate in Los Angeles, former MSA president Ahmed Shama shouted, "Victory to Islam! Death to the Jews!..."
- Prior to the Islamic terrorist attacks of 9-11, the MSA formally assisted the Holy Land Foundation, Global Relief, and the Benevolence Foundation in fundraising. Following the attacks, all three so-called "charities" were ordered closed. The reaction of the MSA? "How three of the nation's largest Muslim charities could be made inoperable at the peak of the giving season of Ramadan seemed unbelievable." Never mind that these three groups were providing funds to Islamic terrorist groups.
Notwithstanding its self-serving claims, the MSA is not a "Muslim civil rights" organization. The MSA is here to promote the intolerant, bigoted, and hateful cult of Islam known as "Wahhabism". From inviting bigots to speak; calling for the death of Jews, and denouncing the closing of Islamic terrorist linked "charities", the MSA has clearly shown that they are on the wrong side in the battle against Islamist terror.
Were Professor Wichman’s words a little strong? In light of the facts about Wahhabi Islam, he is telling the truth. The Wahhabis are one of the most intolerant sects of Islam and have a very brutal history that includes neglect for basic human rights, misogyny toward their own women, the imposition of the most strict forms of Sharia Islamic law and a hatred for Western culture that borders on fanatical. In calling attention to this reality, the professor made the right choice.
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TAMPA -- A judge sentenced former professor Sami Al-Arian on Monday to
another year and a half in prison before he will be deported in his
terrorism conspiracy case.
Al-Arian,
48, was sentenced to four years and nine months, but he will get credit
for the three years and three months he already has served while being
held before and after his trial.
His lawyer, Linda Moreno, asked
the judge to release her client now, but the judge refused and called
Al-Arian "a master manipulator."
Al-Arian signed a plea
agreement April 14 in which he admitted providing support to members of
the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a State Department-designated terrorist
group responsible for hundreds of deaths in Israel and the Palestinian
territories.
The former University of South Florida computer
engineering professor took the plea deal despite a jury failing to
convict him of any of the 17 charges against him after a six-month
trial last year. His family said he took the deal to get out of jail
and end their suffering.
As part of the plea agreement, Al-Arian
admitted to being associated with the Palestinian Islamic Jihad from
the late 1980s and providing "services" for the group, which included
filing for immigration benefits for key members, hiding the identities
of those men and lying about his involvement.
It was not
immediately clear where Al-Arian will be sent once he is deported. Born
in Kuwait to Palestinian refugee parents, he was reared mostly in Egypt
before coming to the United States 30 years ago. He has been jailed
since his arrest in February 2003.
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Al-Arian deal: He admits ties to terror group
Details of Sami Al-Arian's plea agreement emerged Monday after a federal judge unsealed documents related to hearings held last week out of public view.
In it, the fired University of South Florida professor admits being a member of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and helping others associated with the terrorist group -- including his deported brother-in-law Mazen Al-Najjar -- in immigration matters and lying to conceal their ties.
Al-Arian pleaded guilty to one count of "conspiracy to make or receive contributions of funds, goods or services to or for the benefit of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad." In exchange for his guilty plea, prosecutors dropped eight outstanding terrorism-related charges on which jurors deadlocked during a six-month trial.
Prosecutors also agreed to recommend that immigration officials "expedite" Al-Arian's expulsion after his sentencing. His family has previously said their first stop may be Egypt before they try to begin anew in the Palestinian territories.
Department of Justice officials on Monday praised the guilty plea as vindication of their anti-terrorism policies, while Al-Arian's supporters sought to distance the professor from the more serious terrorism charges he once faced.
"We have a responsibility not to allow our nation to be a safe haven for those who provide assistance to the activity of terrorists," U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said.
Ahmed Bedier, a Tampa-based spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said the "plea has nothing to do with violence, and it has nothing to do with financing terrorism."
Two other co-defendants, ex-USF graduate student Sameeh Hammoudeh and Chicago-area businessman Ghassan Ballut, were acquitted. Hammoudeh, a Palestinian, has been held at a Bradenton jail awaiting deportation after pleading guilty in an unrelated tax case.
A fourth defendant, U.S. citizen Hatem Fariz of Spring Hill, still faces a retrial after jurors deadlocked in his case, too. Federal Public Defender R. Fletcher Peacock, whose office represents Fariz, on Monday said plea negotiations are ongoing.
"I think that Dr. Al-Arian's resolution is showing that the government is doing a good-faith effort to resolve the case," Peacock said. "I think that will be reflected in the outcome for our client as well."
Signed Feb. 28, Al-Arian's plea recommends a prison sentence of 46 to 57 months. However, prosecutors have hinted that they will not oppose a lower term, or even a sentence of time served that considers Al-Arian's three years of incarceration.
Al-Arian and his associates were arrested in February 2003 in a case the government once hailed as an example of the controversial USA Patriot Act.
In a jail interview with the Sentinel on Feb. 22, Al-Arian said he would sign a plea deal if there was any way that could be "respectable."
His wife, Nahla Al-Arian, later spoke of her desire for a family reunion.
"Anywhere my husband goes, I will go with him," Nahla said. "I believe that the situation is so suffocating. . . . I don't feel free anymore. Yes, I want to leave. I love America. It breaks my heart to leave everyone here.
"What I want to see is see this suffering end -- for my husband, my kids and myself."
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The Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) has suffered another setback in its effort to gag all those who would criticize its cozy relationship with Hamas and radical Islam. The Canadian branch of CAIR was forced this week to back off its defamation suit against David Harris, Director of the International and Terrorist Intelligence Program (INSIGNIS), a strategic intelligence research corporation based in Ottawa. This retreat comes on the heels of a similar lawsuit that the US division of CAIR filed against Andrew Whitehead, the head of Anti-CAIR in the United States, and was forced recently to withdraw.
Harris had appeared on an Ottawa radio station, CFRA radio, and during an interview made some remarks about the need for Canadian authorities to take a hard look at CAIR-CAN and the fact that some 70% of the funds it raises goes to the American chapter of the organization. He was then hit by a SLAPP lawsuit launched by Dr. Sheema Kahn and Riad Saloojee, the Executive Director of CAIR-CAN. (Both CAIR-CAN leaders have since lost their jobs.)
According to Harris, CAIR-CAN "dropped the suit cold" with no damages, costs, and, as with its dismissed $1.35 million action against ACAIR in the U.S., with no apologies or detailed clarification. A lawyer involved in criminal and national security matters who has testified before the Congress and is a former chief of strategic planning for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, and who appears frequently on radio, Harris said in a prepared press statement:
"As a commentator on national security affairs, my guiding principle throughout CAIR-CAN's lawsuit was never to compromise hard-won rights of media and media commentators to their exercise of responsible free expression under Canada's Charter of Rights and Freedoms. I viewed this as a responsibility at a time when Canadians in Afghanistan and elsewhere are dying for such rights, and when civil liberties must be vigorously defended at home.”
He added, "It is unknown
whether this unease [on the part of the court] stemmed from concern
about the detailed review and disclosures that would derive from such
proceedings. Or
whether the collapse of its mother organization's
US$1.35 million libel case against the American Anti-CAIR organization
played a part. We do not know whether it was the unearthing of a
December 2003 court document in which Dr. Khan had sworn to CAIR-CAN's
subsidiary status in relation to the troubling US CAIR group.
Perhaps
it was a concern that, on the witness stand, CAIR-CAN officials would
be asked to answer the questions I had asked about that relationship on
CFRA radio."
Just as with the Anti-CAIR case, CAIR-CAN sought to spin its loss in a press release stating that Harris, who was a regular "security consultant" on CFRA -radio, would not be invited back as a guest. (He has in fact appeared several times on the channel as a guest since the instigation of the lawsuit.) CAIR-CAN has also suggested that it had silenced its Canadian critics by its legal action, just as it had silenced its critics in the U.S. But the Anti-CAIR group has become even more relentless in its pursuit of CAIR since the lawsuit was dropped.
This is actually the third round in the battle against CAIR and its effort to destabilize the domestic War on Terror that has been won by its opponents.
The first loss came when
CAIR-CAN dropped its suit against columnist David Frum of the National
Post.
Frum, a former White House speechwriter for the Bush administration who
is credited with the "axis of evil" phrase, was sued by CAIR-CAN
because of his suggestion in a (Canadian) National Post
article that CAIR-CAN had terrorist affiliations. Frum issued this
statement about his own case after the David Harris victory: "The
lawsuit against the National Post and myself was settled with
an editor's note that likewise offered no apology or retraction.
The
settlement of the Harris lawsuit should be of special interest to
Canadians. David Harris is one of Canada's leading experts on
terrorism: a former chief of strategic planning for CSIS and now
president of the IINSIGNIS consulting firm. His views are regularly
heard on television and radio. Now he has recovered his full freedom to
speak and to alert Canadians to the dangers in their midst.”
What
lessons will CAIR take from the reverses it has suffered in these three
court actions? Will the organization moderate its support of
Hamas and
other radical Islamist organizations? Will there be a shakeup in
CAIR's leadership, as there has been with CAIR-CAN? And most
importantly, will the "rank and file" membership of CAIR finally
recognize that this organization is not a “civil rights” group and
represents radical Islamists overseas and not ordinary Muslims here at
home?
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CAIR Backs Down from Anti-CAIR
In a stunning setback, the Council on American-Islamic Relations defamation suit against Andrew Whitehead of Anti-CAIR has been dismissed with prejudice. The Anti-CAIR website, www.anti-cair-net.org, reports a mutually agreeable settlement, the terms of which are confidential. However, Whitehead notes that he issued no public apology to CAIR, made no retractions or corrections, and left the Anti-CAIR website unchanged, so that it continues to post the statements that triggered CAIRs suit. Specifically, CAIR had complained about Whitehead calling it a terrorist supporting front organization founded by Hamas supporters that aims to make radical Islam the dominant religion in the United States. It also objected to being described as dedicated to the overthrow of the United States Constitution and the installation of an Islamic theocracy in
That clears the decks; no additional actions are pending between these two parties. In brief, Whitehead won a sweet victory, while CAIR suffered a humiliating defeat.
CAIR initially filed suit in a Virginia Circuit Court on
The original five statements as quoted in CAIRs complaint were:
Let their [sic] be no doubt that CAIR is a terrorist supporting front organization that is partially funded by terrorists, and that CAIR wishes nothing more than the implementation of Sharia law in America.
CAIR is an organization
founded by Hamas supporters which seeks to overthrow Constitutional
government in the
ACAIR reminds our readers that CAIR was started by Hamas members and is supported by terrorist supporting individuals, groups and countries.
Why oppose CAIR? CAIR has
proven links to, and was founded by, Islamic terrorists. CAIR is not in
the
CAIR
is a fundamentalist organization dedicated to the overthrow of the
United States Constitution and the installation of an Islamic theocracy
in
In January
2005, Whiteheads counsel, Reed D. Rubinstein of Greenberg Traurig LLPs
Signs of CAIRs problems came in June 2005, when perhaps realizing how much was available in the public record about its activities, perhaps wishing to curtail some of the discovery process it amended its complaint by dropping nearly all of its original claims. The amended complaint alleged only two brief statements to be false and defamatory:
Let their [sic] be no doubt that CAIR is a terrorist supporting front organization.
CAIR seeks to overthrow
constitutional government in the
(For
an analysis of this amended complaint, see Sharon Chadha and my
article, CAIR Founded by Islamic Terrorists?)
In anticipation of a court hearing regarding discovery, Rubinstein filed papers in the Virginia Circuit Court in October 2005 and December 2005 alleging extensive links between CAIRs organizers and control group with Hamas and other foreign and domestic Islamists. Among other things, these papers alleged:
CAIRs lineage goes back to a key Hamas leader (Musa Abu Marzook), and that CAIR has long been connected with, and exploited the 9/11 attacks to raise money for the Holy Land Foundation, a Hamas front group.
CAIR is heavily supported, financially and otherwise, by suspect Saudi and UAE-based individuals and groups.
CAIR states that the
CAIR refused to respond to Anti-CAIRs discovery requests in its November 2005 response to Rubinstein. For example, it did not admit that Hamas murders innocent civilians, it refused to disclose the identities of its Saudi donors, it declined to answer whether it aims to convert American Christians to Islam, and it avoided questions about the anti-Semitic and anti-American activities of its founder and executive director, Nihad Awad, including his communications with Hamas terrorists, speeches supporting suicide bombings, and advocacy of violence against Jews.
In March 2006, shortly before a scheduled court hearing to decide on several of Whiteheads requests (compelling CAIR to disclose its financial data, to answer questions about its relationship with Hamas and other Islamists, and to provide information regarding its leaders activities and intentions), the case was settled and then dismissed with prejudice by stipulation (meaning, the plaintiff has agreed to forever drop all of the claims that were in, or could have been in, the complaint).
Asked about these developments, CAIRs spokesman, Ibrahim Hooper, confirmed to the New York Sun that the libel case was dismissed at the request of both parties and added that It was settled out of court for an undisclosed amount. Asked if he implied that Whitehead had paid the organization to drop the case, Hooper replied, We filed the suit. Asked the same question again, Hooper repeated the same answer.
Comment:
(1) I had a role in this story, for it was my article, Why Is CAIR Suing Anti-CAIR? published only a week after CAIRs initial filing, that brought this case to Reed Rubinsteins attention and led to Greenberg Traurig LLPs serving as Whiteheads wonderfully capable, pro-bono legal counsel.
(2) In that initial article, I expressed puzzlement why CAIR would voluntarily expose itself to discovery. Did it file this case expecting to steamroll Whitehead, whom CAIR may have perceived as an easy target, and thereby intimidate its critics? What seemed early on to be a mistake by CAIR is now confirmed as such; it ran into a litigation buzz-saw, and it seems to have cut and run. CAIR preferred the ignominy of walking away from the case it initiated rather than open to public scrutiny its finances, its list of supporters, and the beliefs and intentions of its key leaders.
(3) CAIRs November 2005 brief to the court contains several statements of note:
CAIR has
established a status of enviable prestige within highest echelons [sic]
of the
CAIR stands up for
America and speaks out against terrorism in
pronouncements to the general public, thereby earning the enmity of the
very terrorists Whitehead claims CAIR supports (p. 6). Sounds good,
but CAIR did not
provide any evidence in its brief of such enmity.
CAIR
has communicated with various members of the United States Senate
concerning both the Holy Land Foundation and the Global Relief
Foundation. (pp. 27-8) This comes as news. One wonders what information
on these two terrorism-funding groups CAIR provided.
CAIR states that it advised Frontpagemag.com of possible legal action concerning a doctored photograph it employed to illustrate an article written by Whitehead (p. 28). Its amusing that CAIR, which itself famously doctored a photograph, accuses FPM of doing this; in fact, FPM merely posted a graphic, as it often does, one showing Hooper with Hamas figures in the background.
(4) Hooper stated the case settled for an undisclosed amount but did not disclose in which direction that amount went. The terms being confidential, one can only speculate. Perhaps CAIR desperately wanted out of the burdensome, embarrassing, and harmful case it foolishly had initiated? Rubenstein hinted as much when he observed that CAIR became more disposed to settle in late 2005, when a judge was considering what CAIR would have to divulge about its financing and its ties to Hamas and other terrorist groups. Rubenstein told the New York Sun that the lawsuit would have opened up CAIRs finances and their relationships and their principles, their ideological motivations in a way they did not want to be made public.
(5) According to CAIRs own analysis of Whiteheads initial statements, they impute the commission of a criminal offense by CAIR, in that these suggest CAIR actively supports terrorists, and advocates the overthrow of the U.S. Constitution in favor of Islamic law. It bears noting that none of these words were found to be false, they were not retracted, and they remain posted on Anti-CAIRs website.
(6) The collapse of this lawsuit, combined with the even more recent ending of two other CAIR legal actions (versus Cass Ballenger and David Harris), suggests that CAIR is no longer the plaintiff in any court cases; more broadly, what I in 2004 called its pattern of growing litigiousness seems finished.
(7) With CAIRs hopes of
defeating its opponents in the legal arena at least temporarily
defeated, the next step for those of us in
Frontpagemag.com
April, 2006