LETTING THE FOX INTO THE HENHOUSE

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SPRING 2006 • VOLUME XIII: NUMBER 2

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by Daniel Pipes and Sharon Chadha
Middle East Quarterly
Spring 2006
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), headquartered in Washington, is perhaps the best-known and most controversial Muslim organization in North America. CAIR presents itself as an advocate for Muslims' civil rights and the spokesman for American Muslims. "We are similar to a Muslim NAACP," says its communications director, Ibrahim Hooper.[1] Its official mission—"to enhance understanding of Islam, encourage dialogue, protect civil liberties, empower American Muslims, and build coalitions that promote justice and mutual understanding"[2]—suggests nothing problematic.
Links to Hamas

CAIR has a number of links to the terror organization Hamas, starting with the founder of its Texas chapter, Ghassan Elashi, as noted above.


Secondly, Elashi and another CAIR founder, Omar Ahmad, attended a key meeting in Philadelphia in 1993. An FBI memo characterizes this meeting as a planning session for Hamas, Holy Land Foundation, and Islamic Association of Palestine to find ways to disrupt Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy and raise money for Hamas in the United States.[44] The Philadelphia meeting was deemed such strong proof of Islamic Association of Palestine's relation to Hamas that a federal judge in Chicago in December 2004 ruled the Islamic Association of Palestine partially liable for US$156 million in damages (along with the Holy Land Foundation and Mohammad Salah, a Hamas operative)[45] for having aided and abetted the Hamas murder of David Boim, an American citizen.[46]


Third, CAIR's founding personnel were closely linked to the Islamic Association of Palestine, which was founded by Ibrahim Abu Marzook, a senior Hamas operative and husband of Elashi's cousin; according to Epstein, the Islamic Association of Palestine functions as Hamas's public relations and recruitment arm in the United States.[47] The two individuals who established CAIR, Ahmad and Nihad Awad, had been, respectively, the president and public relations director of the Islamic Association of Palestine. Hooper, CAIR's director of communications, had been an employee of the Islamic Association of Palestine.[48] Rafeeq Jabar, president of the Islamic Association of Palestine, was a founding director of CAIR.


Fourth, the Holy Land Foundation, which the U.S. government has charged with funneling funds to Hamas, provided CAIR with some of its start-up funding in 1994. (See $5,000 money transfer, figure 1.) In the other direction, according to Joe Kaufman, CAIR sent potential donors to the Holy Land Foundation's website when they clicked on their post-September 11 weblink, "Donate to the NY/DC Disaster Relief Fund."[49]


Fifth, Awad publicly declared his enthusiasm for Hamas at Barry University in Florida in 1994: "I'm in support of Hamas movement more than the PLO." As an attorney pointed out in the course of deposing Awad for the Boim case, Awad both supported Hamas and acknowledged an awareness of its involvement in violence.[50]
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“Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.”
This was the line from President George W. Bush’s
September 20, 2001 Address to a Joint Session of Congress and the American People that set the ‘Bush Doctrine’ in motion. In the speech, this line made reference to foreign nations that harbored and/or supported terrorists. However, within the ‘war on terrorism,’ the line actually had a much broader meaning -- specifically towards those individuals and groups that supported the enemy right from our own shores. According to Justice Department U.S. Code Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 113B, Section 2339A:

“Whoever provides material support or resources or conceals or disguises the nature, location, source, or ownership of material support or resources, knowing or intending that they are to be used in preparation for, or in carrying out [terrorist acts], or in preparation for, or in carrying out, the concealment or an escape from the commission of any such violation, or attempts or conspires to do such an act, shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 15 years, or both, and, if the death of any person results, shall be imprisoned for any term of years or for life.”

One group in particular, CAIR or the Council on American-Islamic Relations, an entity masquerading as a ‘civil rights’ organization, has called into question its own support for nefarious causes. The following will prove that, in late 2001, CAIR appeared to be in violation of United States law, as in regards to the providing of material support to terrorists.

In September of 2001, just following the worst terrorist attack ever suffered in modern history, CAIR placed on its website, under a picture of the World Trade Center in flames, a plea for donations. It read, “Donate to the NY/DC Emergency Relief Fund.”

Yet, when people clicked on the link, it did not take them to any NY/DC Emergency Relief Fund. No, it took them straight to the website of the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, an Islamic ‘charity’ that was soon to be shut down by the United States for “raising millions of dollars annually for HAMAS.”

The fact that CAIR was toying with the emotions of persons wanting to give money to a fund that CAIR disguised as one related to the 9/11 attacks is despicable…The fact that CAIR was asking people to donate to an organization that was raising millions for a terrorist organization that regularly sends suicide squads to murder innocent people is reprehensible. Under the right circumstances, it would also be criminal...but that is a determination for the appropriate authorities to make, after their (much delayed, and much needed) investigation commences.
Later that month, on September 25, 2001, CAIR changed the link to explicitly ask persons to “Donate through the Holy Land Foundation.” And in addition, CAIR added a new link to its site, soliciting persons to “Donate through the Global Relief Foundation.”

The Global Relief Foundation, like the Holy Land Foundation, was soon to be shut down by the U.S. government on terrorism related charges. As stated by the Treasury Department, “The Global Relief Foundation has connections to, has provided support for, and has provided assistance to Usama Bin Ladin, the al-Qaeda Network, and other known terrorist groups.”

At the time of the Holy Land Foundation’s closure, on December 4, 2001, CAIR immediately took the Holy Land Foundation link off of its site. And less than a week after the Global Relief Foundation’s December 14, 2001 closure, CAIR removed that group’s link as well.

The question we now have to ask is, “Did CAIR know that these organizations existed as terrorist related entities, prior to CAIR removing the links?” Or, considering CAIR’s connection to both offending organizations, the more appropriate question would be, “How did they not know?”

Mousa Abu Marzook – Grandfather of CAIR

The Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development was founded by HAMAS leader Mousa Abu Marzook, a man who was deported by the United States to Jordan in 1997. Marzook, who may very well be, today, second in command of HAMAS, also founded, in 1981, CAIR’s parent organization, the Islamic Association for Palestine.

This is important, when considering the previous questions asked, but – but – there is a much bigger connection to CAIR, with respect to the Holy Land Foundation.

Ghassan Elashi – CAIR Board Member

The Chairman of the Holy Land Foundation, before the group’s closure, was Ghassan Elashi. Elashi, in December of 2002, was charged with “selling computers and computer parts to Libya and Syria, both designated state sponsors of terrorism.”

Besides the Holy Land Foundation, Ghassan Elashi was also involved with CAIR. In fact, Elashi was one of the founding board members of CAIR’s Texas chapter. What this means is that CAIR didn’t just stick a link to the Holy Land Foundation on its website, but instead, CAIR was directly linked to the Holy Land Foundation itself!

Rabih Haddad – CAIR Fundraiser

Rabih Haddad was a co-founder of the Global Relief Foundation. Before being deported by the United States to Lebanon in July of 2003, Haddad had held various positions with Global Relief, including that of Executive Director and Public Relations Director.

And like Ghassan Elashi, Haddad was also active in CAIR. According to the Quaker organization, the group that runs the large charitable foundation, the American Friends Service Committee, Haddad had served as a fundraiser for CAIR.

Just as in the previous case, this shows that the Global Relief Foundation was not only a link on the CAIR website, but that CAIR was directly involved in the organization.

Considering this evidence, it would be somewhat difficult for CAIR to deny any knowledge of the two pseudo-charities’ nefarious involvements -- involvements that directly led to the murders of innocents abroad. This includes the December 2, 2001 suicide bombing of a bus in Haifa, Israel, murdering 15 and wounding 40 others… and the suicide bombing in an entertainment area in Jerusalem, which took the lives of 11 young people, just a day earlier.

Both incidents occurred, while CAIR was soliciting funds for the terrorist charities on its site. If CAIR was indeed involved, under the Justice Department code stated earlier, it could result in life imprisonment for all implicated.

But while it’s hard for CAIR to run away from its connections to the Holy Land Foundation and the Global Relief Foundation, because of the connections, it’s easy to understand why CAIR tried vigorously to defend and protect the groups.

CAIR called the closure of the Holy Land Foundation “unjust” and “disturbing.” And CAIR described the closure of the Global Relief Foundation as the racial profiling of an organization that “had established a track record of effective relief work.”

If CAIR wasn’t involved in the conspiracy, why would it go out of its way to defend terror related organizations? Any group that claims to value human rights would run as far away from these organizations as possible. But CAIR did not.

The reason seems clear. Now, it’s time for the United States government to investigate this matter.

Joe Kaufman is the Chairman of Americans Against Hate. You can visit the group’s website, at www.americansagainsthate.com. And you can view all of Joe’s archived articles, at www.joe4rep.com.

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