THE UNHOLY ALLIANCE BETWEEN ISLAM AND SOCIALISM
Unholy Alliance: The "Peace Left" and the Islamic Jihad
Against America
By David Horowitz and John Perazzo
April 13, 2005
[Authors’ note: This is the first in a series of articles and visual maps describing the unholy alliances that have been formed between American leftists and radical Islam, unlikely allies who have joined efforts to oppose America’s defensive War on Terror and its war of liberation in Iraq. These are mainly (but not exclusively) de facto alliances, much as the Hitler-Stalin Pact was an alliance of convenience based on a common interest: the enemy of my enemy is my friend. This article is accompanied by a "visual map" which displays the actual alliance between the so-called American "peace left" and organizations that are part of, or supportive of, the radical Islamic jihad against the United States. This map is one of the hundreds of similar maps we have devised for DiscoverTheNetwork.org, our encyclopedic guide to the political left.]
The present article focuses on the so-called "peace left" – so called because most of the individuals participating in it are not pacifists and are not really interested in peace as such, but in radical agendas that are served by opposing America’s war on terror. (Thus there were no "peace" demonstrations at the Iraqi embassy calling on the government of Saddam Hussein to comply with seventeen U.N. resolutions which the war was undertaken to enforce.)
The peace left’s core consists of the ideological descendents of the communist/progressive left that wanted the West to lose the Cold War to the Soviet Union. This no mere motley crew of inconsequential fringe extremists, but is in fact the well-organized, militant, and immensely influential driving force behind the contemporary peace movement and the enormous anti-war rallies it has recently staged. Upon the foundation of its hatred for the United States, the peace left has forged its alliance with radical Islam, whose wellspring of anti-American hatred runs just as deep.
In word and deed, both of these allies make it plain that they consider everything about the United States to be evil and unworthy of preservation; that they wish to see American society and its way of life crushed by any means necessary, including violent revolution. Their position was well summarized by the now-infamous professor Ward Churchill, who asserted that terrorist violence directed against the United States is a morally justifiable response to what he characterizes as the U.S. government’s "rape" and "murder" of other peoples. "If we want an end to violence," says Churchill, "especially that perpetrated against civilians, we must take the responsibility for halting the slaughter perpetrated by the United States around the world." Churchill does not, however, harbor any hopes that America might mend its alleged flaws; rather, he advocates the country’s destruction: "I want the state gone: transform the situation to U.S. out of North America. U.S. off the planet. Out of existence altogether." Toward this end, Churchill candidly endorses further acts of anti-American terror. "One of the things I’ve suggested," he says, "is that it may be that more 9/11s are necessary." Lamenting that the terrorism of 9/11 had proved "insufficient to accomplish its purpose" of eviscerating the United States, Churchill wrote, "What the hell? It was worth a try."
These sentiments are echoed by no less a figure than Osama bin Laden, who in 1998 issued the following edict: "We—with God’s help—call on every Muslim who believes in God and wishes to be rewarded to comply with God’s order to kill the Americans and plunder their money wherever and whenever they find it. We also call on Muslim ulema, leaders, youths, and soldiers to launch the raid on Satan’s U.S. troops and the devil’s supporters allying with them, and to displace those who are behind them so that they may learn a lesson. The ruling to kill the Americans and their allies—civilians and military—is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which it is possible to do it."
By drawing attention to the alliances between (and the common objectives of) the radical left and radical Islam, DiscoverTheNetwork (DTN) has hit a raw nerve for some. Critics have accused DTN of lumping together all leftists as traitors who sympathize with America’s jihadist enemies. In an effort to make clear the distinctions between the most radical and the more moderate gradations of leftism, DTN has refined the photo grid that was the source of much indignation. Yet the source of the criticism – the self-described patriotic left – has failed to draw any similar distinctions between itself and the radical, anti-American left that in fact does endorse the permanent evisceration of American society. Nowhere is this failure to dissociate from America’s enemies more evident than in the peace movement, where teeming masses of people have participated in demonstrations organized by hard-line Communists whose most fervent wish is not to bring about the establishment of a lasting peace, but rather to see the United States toppled by an attack from without or a revolution from within.
The Workers World PartyIslamic jihadist organizations such as al Qaeda openly advocate the destruction of the United States, on grounds that it is allegedly a land of infidels that has badly mistreated the Muslim world. Their contempt for America – the so-called "Great Satan" – is invariably accompanied by a desire to destroy its ally Israel – the "Little Satan." This baneful agenda is shared by those American radical groups that are the major players in the contemporary anti-war movement, on grounds that the U.S. is allegedly an aggressive, imperialistic nation that seeks to impose the evils of capitalism on the rest of the world. Some of these radical groups actually want to be part of the jihad against the United States; they identify with its objectives much as the old communist movement identified with the Soviet Union and its aims. This is a small and somewhat despised minority on the left but remarkably effective nonetheless.
Among the most important groups to openly espouse the jihadist ideal of destroying the United States is the Workers World Party (WWP), a Marxist-Leninist sect that uses the anti-war movement as the vehicle by which it promotes Communist objectives and condemns American society, American foreign policy, and capitalism. This organization was a chief organizer of the major national demonstrations against the current war in Iraq. It was founded in 1959 by Sam Marcy, who in the 1960s led demonstrations against America’s involvement in the Vietnam War and openly rooted for a Viet Cong victory. Under Marcy’s leadership, the WWP even coordinated some of its activities with those of the North Vietnamese Communist forces. For example, an April 8, 1972 internal letter "To All Branches" of the party exhorted members to participate in "antiwar" demonstrations that would give encouragement and moral support to a Viet Cong offensive in South Vietnam. The man who authored that letter, John Catalinotto, is today the managing editor of the WWP’s weekly newspaper, Workers World.
The WWP continues to idolize the former Soviet dictator and mass murderer Joseph Stalin, and regards Fidel Castro as a hero of the common man. WWP members who joined the Venceremos Brigades in the 1960s and early 1970s were trained in revolutionary tactics by Castro’s intelligence agency. It was during that era that the party also developed a close ideological bond with Communist North Korea and its then-President Kim Il Sung. Moreover, the WWP supported the Soviet invasions of Czechoslovakia and Afghanistan, as well as the regime of Slobodan Milocevic in the former Yugoslavia. To this day, the party is a faithful backer of North Korean President Kim Jong Il – notwithstanding the barbarous atrocities and human rights violations he has engineered.
The WWP website proclaims, "We’re independent Marxists who respect the struggles for self-determination and progress of oppressed nations. We try to understand their problems in a world dominated by Western imperialism. We don’t jump on the bandwagon when Third World leaders are demonized. Our goal is solidarity of all the workers and oppressed against this criminal imperialist system. . . . We fight hard for a better life right now, but we know that nothing is secure - not our jobs, our homes, our health care, our pensions, our civil rights and liberties - as long as capitalism exists. So our goal is a society run by the workers, not just as pawns in a capitalist political game but as collective owners of the social wealth." The WWP seeks to destroy the U.S. so as to rid the world of what it deems the evils of capitalism, much as the Islamic jihadists seek to avenge the alleged transgressions of America’s religious infidels.
Though it currently has only about 2,000 members, the WWP has
been extremely effective in organizing the massive anti-war rallies of recent
years, some of which have drawn hundreds of thousands of participants. To
achieve its objectives, the WWP uses a number of front groups, all of which are
run by WWP members and spokesmen. Among the most important of these groups is
International ANSWER, whose name is an acronym for Act Now to Stop War and End
Racism. In ANSWER’s view, the U.S. is the world’s foremost terrorist nation and,
as such, has no right to respond militarily to any act of war committed against
it. This was the message that ANSWER, through its leaders and other guest
speakers, communicated to the cheering throngs attending its demonstrations in
2002-03. It is impossible to estimate how many of the ostensibly well-meaning
attendees at such rallies concluded, from the rhetoric they heard there, that
being on the side of "peace" required them to also embrace all of ANSWER’s
scurrilous assertions about the United States.
Well represented in the ANSWER steering committee are Muslim organizations that
embrace the anti-American and anti-Israel ideals of the jihadists. These
include the following:
· Free Palestine Alliance (FPA): Advocating "justice and liberation" for the people of "Palestine," this group depicts Israel as an oppressor nation that tramples on the civil and human rights of Palestinians, though in fact Palestinians in Israel enjoy more freedoms and civil rights protections than their Muslim counterparts in any Islamic nation on earth. FPA also opposes the post-9/11 anti-terrorism legislation known as the Patriot Act, on grounds that it allegedly violates the civil liberties of Americans.
· Muslim Students Association (MSA): This is a key lobbying organization for the Wahhabi sect of Islam. From its inception, MSA had close links with the extremist Muslim World League. Various MSA chapters’ websites have featured not only Osama bin Laden’s propaganda, but also publicity and recruiting campaigns for Wahhabi subversion of the Chechen struggle in Russia. In recent years, MSA solicited donations for the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, whose assets the U.S. government seized in December 2001 because that organization was giving financial support to the terrorist group Hamas. MSA also maintains strong ties to the Virginia-based World Assembly of Muslim Youth (WAMY), established in 1972 and directed from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. WAMY’s Virginia offices have been a central target of the U.S. government’s post-9/11 investigation of Islamist groups suspected of funding terrorism. Opposed to the American military incursions into both Afghanistan and Iraq, MSA maintains a large presence at ANSWER-sponsored demonstrations. At a March 15, 2003 rally in San Francisco, MSA representatives displayed and distributed anti-Israel publications, banners, and placards – many of which replaced the letter "s" in "Israel" with a swastika, while others likened the Star of David to a swastika.
·
Middle East Childrens Alliance (MECA):
Founded in 1988 by
Barbara Lubin, this group combines
humanitarian aid to the Middle East (primarily to Palestinians and Lebanon) with
a consistently pro-Palestinian militant, anti-Israeli political message. Lubin
and fellow MECA representative Penny Rosenwasser are both allied with the WWP
and occasionally speak at ANSWER rallies and press conferences. MECA opposes
Israel’s construction of the anti-terrorist security fence in the West Bank,
characterizing it as an illegal "apartheid wall" that violates the civil and
human rights of Palestinians.
As evidenced by the presence of these groups on ANSWER’s steering committee, the theoretical affinities between the American left and radical Islam have actual, practical consequences. The Palestinian jihadists are well represented in ANSWER, as they are in other major anti-war organizations.
In ANSWER’s post-9/11 anti-war demonstrations, acknowledgment that the U.S. had been attacked on its own soil was all but absent from the speeches denouncing America’s consideration, and ultimate implementation, of military reprisal. The featured speakers at these events condemned the U.S. for making a "rush to war" in alleged pursuit of a global empire and control of Middle Eastern oil. From the podiums of these rallies, America was impugned as a "rogue state" and a "terrorist state"; President Bush was likened to Adolph Hitler; the CIA was equated with al Qaeda; and countless calls were issued for "regime change" in America rather than in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq.
Many of those attending these rallies were undoubtedly well-meaning individuals who sincerely wished to express their personal disapproval of America’s wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, or of the larger War on Terror. Surely many were drawn to such demonstrations by a desire to avoid the bloodshed and loss of innocent life that, however unintended, all wars necessarily bring. In our democracy, the right to dissent is sacrosanct, and there is no implication here than all Americans who do not fall in lockstep with Bush administration policies necessarily sympathize with America’s jihadist enemies and wish to see the United States brought to ruin.
But neither can those dissenters be excused for being utterly uninformed about the nature of the allies whose anti-war chorus they have chosen to join. Virtually without exception, the major peace rallies attended by Americans nationwide have been organized by hard-line communists – representing ANSWER as well as other organizations that are discussed in the remainder of this essay – with long track-records of uniformly opposing all U.S. foreign and domestic policies, and siding with America’s enemies in the Cold War and in every other international conflict of the past 50 years. This is not an insignificant detail.
The International Action CenterANSWER is an appendage of the International Action Center (IAC), a Stalinist organization with a long history of supporting authoritarian regimes and communist dictatorships. Professing to stand for "Information, Activism, and Resistance to U.S. Militarism, War, and Corporate Greed," the IAC is an umbrella foundation for a host of anti-war radical groups; it is staffed by members who share a dual responsibility for the WWP. Believing that the United States can do nothing right, the IAC has indicted every American president since Harry Truman for alleged war crimes against the people of North and South Korea, and has charged the U.S. with war crimes in Iraq. By contrast, it has turned a blind eye to the barbarities of socialist dictators like the late Yasser Arafat, North Korea’s Kim Jong Il, and Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic. The IAC has represented Milosevic at the International Court and charged the Court itself – rather than Milosevic – with war crimes. The IAC has also condemned U.S. involvement in Central and South America, but holds Cuba in high esteem and never criticizes Cuban military involvement anywhere.
The founder and current leader of the IAC is Ramsey Clark, who was the U.S. Attorney General during President Lyndon Johnson’s administration. Now a defense attorney, Clark has built a career representing and counseling individuals and groups he characterizes as victims of U.S. political repression and human rights violations. In his estimation, Saddam Hussein was not the brutal tyrant of popular depiction; the real tyrant, said Clark, was George W. Bush, and the real terrorist nation was America. In an open letter to President Bush in 2003, Clark stated angrily, "A huge, all-powerful nation has assaulted a small prostrate, defenseless people [Iraqis] half way around the world with ‘Shock and Awe’ terror." After Saddam’s capture in December 2003, Clark eagerly volunteered to join the legal defense team of the ousted Iraqi dictator accused of thirty years of war crimes. Retained by Serbia as U.S. counsel, Clark has also been involved in the defense of Slobodan Milosevic. His other clients have included Communist North Vietnam, the theocratic Islamic regime of Iran, and the Communist dictatorship of North Korea.
Moreover, Clark is a staunch defender of Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, leader of the Islamic Group, an Egypt-based terrorist organization with close links to Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda network. Rahman was convicted of helping engineer the 1993 World Trade Center bombing as well as a failed Islamic Group plan (known as "The Day of Terror") to destroy other Manhattan landmarks including the Holland and Lincoln tunnels, the United Nations building, and the George Washington Bridge. While Rahman’s ideals on civil liberties and human rights may differ markedly from Clark’s, their shared hatred for the U.S. is a common bond that serves as the basis of their alliance.
Joining ANSWER and the IAC as a major force in the anti-war movement is the group Not In Our Name (NION), a self-described "peace" organization that denounces the post-9/11 "injustices done by our government" in its pursuit of "endless war"; America’s greed-driven "transfusions of blood for oil"; its determination to "erode [our] freedoms"; and its eagerness to "invade countries, bomb civilians, kill more children, [and annihilate] families on foreign soil." ANSWER and NION organized all of the major antiwar demonstrations prior to February 2003.
NION was founded by the longtime Maoist activist C. Clark Kissinger, a member of America’s premier Maoist organization, the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP). Kissinger began his public activism in the early 1960s when he was the national secretary of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), the leading radical organization of its day. In 1969 SDS became the Weather Underground, America’s first terrorist cult. Kissinger also worked closely with the Black Panther Party and supported Mao Tse-tung’s Communist regime in China, responsible for the deaths of at least 50 million people. Kissinger founded the U.S.-China People’s Friendship Association in 1971, traveled extensively in China during the Cultural Revolution, and supported the 1979 Khomeini-led revolution in Iran. In 1987 Kissinger founded the radical group Refuse & Resist to serve as a recruiting office for the RCP. He remains a contributing writer to the RCP publication Revolutionary Worker.
Kissinger continues to enjoy strong support from the Maoist Internationalist Movement (MIM), which, in its own words, "upholds the revolutionary communist ideology of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism," and views the Chinese Cultural Revolution as "the farthest advance of communism in human history." Chief among MIM’s objectives is to foment "revolution [in] North America." Consistent with that aim, Kissinger and the RCP enthusiastically cheered the 1992 rioting (ostensibly triggered by the court verdict in the Rodney King case) in Los Angeles, deeming it a justified "rebellion" against American racism and oppression. On the ten-year anniversary of the rioting, RCP member Joseph Veale fondly recalled the violence as "the most beautiful, the most heroic civil action in the history of the United States." Former LAPD Police Chief Robert Vernon recounts how the RCP helped instigate the riots: "The RCP and other people tried to get a riot started [in the Foothill Precinct, where the Rodney King beating had taken place], because of the symbolism of having it start at the location of the King arrest. In the late afternoon on April 29th, over 400 of them stormed the Foothill [police] station, tried to set fires, and at one point even fired some shots into the air, we think. . . . It was unbelievable. The RCP people were there in force. They were allowed to burn the guard shack and then actually charge the doors at Parker Center and break the windows."
Kissinger similarly applauded the 2001 Cincinnati riots – which he called "spirited and righteous protest" – that erupted following a police shooting of a young black man in that city. He views the U.S. as a nation where "white supremacy" and "xenophobic attacks" carry the day. True to his Marxist ideals, he craves the destruction of America and all its institutions. "The problem in this country," says Kissinger, is "the oppressive system of capitalism that exploits people all over the world, that destroys our planet, that oppresses minority people, that sends people to the death chambers in droves. That is a problem that has to be done away with. . . . Revolution is the solution."
Like the WWP and ANSWER, the RCP shares the jihadist goal of destroying the U.S. The RCP set up terrorist training camps in Colorado, drawing people from the Iranian Student Association and the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA) – the latter of which is known for its involvement in heroin trafficking. Police have also linked the RCP to heavy-weapons-trafficking endeavors carried out in unison with the Ohio-based Outlaws motorcycle gang. In October 1983, the RCP collaborated with the European terrorist underground to sabotage American efforts to deploy Pershing and cruise missiles in Germany. Kissinger led an eight-week tour of Germany to lay the framework for those efforts. RCP members penetrated Mutlangen U.S. military base in West Germany, where Pershing II intermediate-range missiles were stored. In November 1983, RCP members were involved, along with Red Cells and other German anarchist-terrorists, in an assault against Vice President George Bush's caravan during the latter’s visit to Krefeld, Germany. In its January 18, 1984 issue, Revolutionary Worker called for the assassination of President Reagan. The RCP has ties to both Peru’s Marxist guerrilla group known as the Shining Path and the Communist Party of Nepal.
Robert Avakian is the founder and current "chairman-in-exile" of the RCP. As a result of 1981 criminal indictments issued against him and several other RCP leaders for their break-in to White House grounds during a Presidential ceremony, Avakian and his cohorts fled to Paris, where they have been living in exile ever since. From his French headquarters, Avakian continues to agitate for the violent overthrow of the U.S. government, embracing the concept of an intellectual vanguard leading the proletariat in revolution.
Patriotism As an "Embarrassment"
Such are some of the leading lights of the so-called "peace" movement today. The self-described patriotic left has, for the most part, not bothered to dissociate itself from this socialist, radical, anti-American left whose primary agenda is not to achieve a lasting peace, but rather to discredit the United States in the eyes of the world and to condemn America as a racist, imperialist, aggressor seeking nothing less than world domination and control of the earth’s oil reserves. Similarly, the leftwing media have all but failed to distance themselves from these radical elements, or to bluntly call them what they in fact are: America-hating Communists who want the nation’s Islamist foes to emerge victorious in the War on Terror. To their credit, a few media outlets such as Salon and The Nation have distanced themselves from International ANSWER; but they have not criticized the equally important and equally radical Global Exchange or United for Peace and Justice.
These latter two groups, which are discussed below, share with the Islamists a negative bond of intense anti-American hatred. While they do not share the Islamists’ religious ideals, they fervently wish to see the United States and its capitalist economic system crumble. As Osama bin Laden declared in a fatwa issued on Al-Jazeera Television just before American and British troops entered Iraq in March 2003: "The interests of Muslims and the interests of the socialists coincide in the war against the crusaders." Just as bin Laden characterizes Americans as "crusaders" seeking to expand their empire into Muslim lands, so does the socialist left charge that all American foreign policy is predicated on imperialistic ambition and a lust for oil. Just as Islamic radicals wish to impose their brand of Islam on America and institute strict Islamic law on a global scale, so does the radical left seek to create a socialist ideal state and abolish capitalism from the earth. In the lexicon of Muslim fundamentalists, America is the Great Satan; to the radical left, America is a nation worthy of destruction because it is the embodiment of evil and injustice. The spirit of contempt and the impulse to sow the seeds of destruction is equally intense in both camps.
As Middle East expert Bernard Lewis observes, "the sinfulness and also the degeneracy of America and its consequent threat to Islam and the Muslim peoples [have become] articles of faith in Muslim fundamentalist circles." In The Crisis of Islam, Lewis writes, "By now there is an almost standardized litany of American offenses recited in the lands of Islam, in the media, pamphlets, in sermons, and in public speeches."
The same litany can be found in the writings and oratory of
the American peace left, whose mouthpieces regularly impugn every conceivable
aspect of U.S. culture and policy. Against the backdrop of their negative view
of their country, they consider patriotism to be nothing short of shameful. This
mindset is explained by Professor
Todd Gitlin, a former president of
Students for a Democratic Society and a
self-declared "anti-anti Communist" of the 1960s who chose not to support the
West during the Cold War against the Communist states. Notably, Gitlin did not
feel a positive identification with the Soviet Union, but rather with a utopian
ideal that he expected to emerge in Vietnam, Cuba, or some other revolutionary
state. His rejection of patriotism as an American did not stem from his love for
any particular enemy of the United States, but rather from a negative revulsion
he felt toward America as a result of its participation in the Vietnam War.
"The war went on so long and so destructively," says Gitlin, "it felt like more
than the consequence of a wrong-headed policy. My country must have been
revealing some fundamental core of wrongness by going on, and on, with an
indefensible war. . . . The American flag did not feel like my flag, even though
I could recognize—in the abstract—that it made sense for others to wave it in
the anti-war cause." In the early stages of the war, Gitlin "argued against
waving the North Vietnamese flag or burning the Stars and Stripes. . . . But the
hatred of a bad war, in what was evidently a pattern of bad wars—though none so
bad as Vietnam—turned us inside out. It inflamed our hearts. You can hate your
country in such a way that the hatred becomes fundamental. A hatred so clear and
intense came to feel like a cleansing flame. By the late ’60s, this is what
became of much of the New Left." Adds Gitlin, "For a large bloc of Americans, my
age and younger, too young to remember World War II—the generation for whom ‘the
war’ meant Vietnam and possibly always would, to the end of our days—the case
against patriotism was not an abstraction. There was a powerful experience
underlying it: as powerful an eruption of our feelings as the experience of
patriotism is supposed to be for patriots. Indeed, it could be said that in the
course of our political history we experienced a very odd turn about: The most
powerful public emotion in our lives was rejecting patriotism."
This negative view of America, rather than a positive view of America’s Islamist
enemies, is what animates much of the contemporary peace movement as well. Many
of the movement’s leaders are New Leftists who, like Gitlin, developed their
anti-American hatred during the Vietnam era.
One such individual is the lifelong Communist revolutionary Medea Benjamin, a profoundly important player in the anti-war left. Like Ramsey Clark and C. Clark Kissinger, Benjamin detests the United States, whose post-9/11 invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq she sees as evidence of a sinister U.S. plan for global dominance. This hatred stands in stark contrast to her great affection for Fidel Castro’s Cuba, a place she has glowingly described as "heaven." Bitterly anti-capitalist, Benjamin was a principal organizer of the 1999 Seattle riots in which some 50,000 protesters wreaked havoc and tried to shut down the World Trade Organization meetings.
Condemning America’s post-9/11 attack on the Taliban, Benjamin said, "We must insist that governments stop taking innocent lives in the name of seeking justice for the loss of other innocent lives." Lamenting that Washington had "responded to the violent attack of 9/11 with the notion of perpetual war," she advised Americans to examine "the root causes of resentment against the United States in the Arab world – from our dependence on Middle Eastern oil to our biased policy towards Israel." The bombings, she said, "made Afghans so upset that some [have] talked about waging a jihad, or holy war, against the United States. . . . If the Muslim world sees the United States as willing to bomb but not feed people, it will deepen the suspicion and mistrust already felt by millions . . . that the United States doesn’t care about the lives of the Muslim people." Benjamin draws no moral distinction between the 9/11 attacks and America’s military response against the Taliban. In the aftermath of the U.S. victory in Afghanistan, she led a delegation of relatives of murdered 9/11 victims — members of the group September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows — to Afghanistan to meet with individuals who had lost loved ones to American artillery.
Deeming America a nation infested with injustice and oppression, Benjamin sees nothing in the United States that is worth fighting for or defending. "When most Americans hear of human rights abuses," she states, "they likely think of atrocities in some far-off country in a forgotten corner of the globe. . . . [But] abuses against individuals’ basic rights also occur regularly here in the United States, and our money-saturated political system hardly deserves the title ‘democracy.’" Like the radical Islamists, Benjamin would welcome a revolutionary overthrow of the U.S. government, American culture, and capitalism.
Benjamin’s kindred spirit in the peace movement is Leslie Cagan, leader of the anti-war coalition United For Peace and Justice (UFPJ). UFPJ was officially created on October 25, 2002 in the Washington, DC offices of People For the American Way. Prior to UFPJ’s founding, the anti-war movement – led by ANSWER and NION – had earned a reputation as a hodgepodge of extremely radical elements that made many would-be sympathizers uneasy; UFPJ was created for the purpose of putting a milder face on the movement. The distinction between UFPJ and the aforementioned organizations, however, was merely symbolic rather than substantive. From its inception, UFPJ shared with those groups a passionate hatred for the United States, a readiness to condemn any and every American foreign policy decision, and a commitment to anti-American and anti-capitalist agendas. UFPJ’s initial membership consisted of approximately 70 organizations; that number now exceeds 800.
UFPJ’s radical agendas are visible through the transparent lens of Cagan’s longstanding ideals. A strong supporter of Fidel Castro, Cagan is a committed socialist who proudly aligns her politics with those of Communist Cuba. For seven years she directed the Cuba Information Project, demanding that the U.S. end its economic embargo of, and travel ban to, Cuba. She was a 1960s radical who, as a college student, became an activist in the Communist movement; in 1968 she broke American laws to travel to the Communist World Youth Festival in Bulgaria. The following year she joined the First Venceremos Brigade, a project initiated by the Cuban intelligence agency to recruit American leftists to help harvest sugar cane. Throughout the 1960s, Cagan was a key organizer of anti-Vietnam War protests; in the 1970s she continued to participate in the pro-Castro Venceremos Brigades; in the 1980s she supported the Communist movements in Central America while organizing demonstrations demanding an American nuclear freeze; and she was among the earliest supporters of solidarity efforts with Yasser Arafat’s Palestinian terrorists. She opposed the 1991 Gulf War. Six years later, in violation of U.S. law, she coordinated the U.S. delegation to the World Youth Festival in Cuba. Over the past three decades, Cagan has mobilized millions of demonstrators in rallies denouncing America’s foreign policies; its military-related spending; and its purportedly virulent racism, sexism, and homophobia.
In late 2004, Cagan, Benjamin, and a handful of other leftist radicals delivered $600,000 worth of cash and goods to jihadists who were fighting American troops in Fallujah, Iraq. This money was raised jointly by Global Exchange, United For Peace and Justice, Code Pink for Peace (another antiwar group founded by Benjamin), and the Middle East Childrens Alliance (whose advisory board includes Ramsey Clark, Noam Chomsky, and Fathi Arafat – brother of the late Yasser Arafat).
Benjamin and Cagan also united to establish
Iraq Occupation Watch, whose express
purpose is to persuade American troops to defect en masse as
conscientious objectors, thereby weakening U.S. forces and leading, hopefully,
to an American defeat in Iraq. "Working with local communities where U.S. troops
are based," wrote Benjamin, "let’s start a ‘Bring All the Troops Home’ campaign
to stop the expansion of U.S. bases and start dismantling some of the hundreds
of existing bases overseas." She also exhorted "grassroots teams" to "link up
with appropriate local and regional groups" in terrorist states. To run the
Occupation Watch Center in Iraq, Benjamin appointed Nerween al-Mufti, an Iraqi
who, for two decades, had been a journalist for Saddam Hussein’s
state-controlled press.
UFPJ coalition members include many leftwing and communist groups, as well as a
number of organizations sympathetic to the jihadist aims of the Islamists
who seek the destruction not only of the United States, but of Israel as well.
Among these coalition members are the following national groups or their local
chapters:
Alliance for Jewish-Christian-Muslim Understanding: Stating that the Koran generally teaches "love and toleration," this group’s website provides links to the websites of such radical leftwing organizations as the American Friends Service Committee, the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, the Womens International League for Peace and Freedom, Womens Action for New Directions, September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, and the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC): The ADC has become a strident voice against what it depicts as the Bush administration’s efforts to curtail the civil liberties of Arab Americans. Characterizing the anti-terrorist measures pursued by the Justice and Treasury Departments as persecution based on ethnic discrimination, the ADC charges that "ethnic profiling" is rampant in official U.S. dealings with Arab and Muslim Americans. After 9/11, the ADC became a leading defender of Palestinian "martyrdom" campaigns inside Israel. It also became a strong defender of Saudi Arabia, whose role in funding Wahhabism, the extreme sect rejected by the majority of Muslims worldwide, had come under scrutiny after disclosure that 15 of the 19 suicide pilots on September 11th were Saudi subjects.In early 2004 the ADC played a key role in the passage of measures condemning the USA Patriot Act by the New York and Los Angeles City Councils. It was a co-plaintiff in the first major legal challenge to a section of the Patriot Act – specifically Section 215, which allows for government access to such information as medical, educational, and library records pursuant to a terrorism investigation. The Georgia and San Francisco chapters of the ADC were signatories to a February 20, 2002 document, composed by C. Clark Kissinger’s Refuse & Resist, condemning military tribunals and the detention of immigrants apprehended in connection with post-9/11 terrorism investigations.
The ADC's Michigan chapter is headed by Imad Hamad. According to columnist Debbie Schlussel, Hamad is a member of the terrorist group Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Schlussel has uncovered a number of incriminating facts about Hamad: (a) As of October 2003, Hamad was under investigation on more than a dozen terrorism-related charges. One of those charges centered around his active involvement with a Detroit charity that openly declared on its tax forms that it had given a significant amount of money to the Jordanian operations of the terror group Hamas. (b) Hamad and the leaders of that charity traveled to Lebanon, where they met with their friends from Hezbollah, and to Syria. They are believed to be laundering money to terrorists in those nations. (c) In 2004 Hamad held a celebration for Hezbollah terrorists released from an Israeli jail in a prisoner swap. In his ADC-Michigan newsletter, he referred to the freed convicts, many of whom had murdered Jews and Americans, as "the Heroes."
American Muslims for Jerusalem (AMJ): This organization is sponsored by six of the most powerful American Islamic institutions, including those that receive the most frequent invitations to the White House and are cited most often by the media. Moreover, AMJ has successfully lobbied such corporate giants as Burger King and the Disney Corporation. The group led a boycott against Burger King in response to the fast-food franchise having built a restaurant in an Israeli settlement community, and pressured Disney not to list Jerusalem as the "Jewish capital" of Israel at a World Expo in Florida.AMJ frequently publicizes false stories about Christians and Muslims being discriminated against by Israel in Jerusalem, while behind the scenes it works to support the goals of terrorist groups like Hamas and Hezbollah. Terrorism expert Steve Emerson has called AMJ an organization that "routinely involves anti-Zionist campaigns and has featured calls at its conferences for the killing of Jews." The group has ties to the American Muslim Council (AMC), whose leader Abdurahman Alamoudi has publicly expressed support for Hamas and Hezbollah, the latter of which has killed more Americans than any other terrorist group, including 241 U.S. military personnel in Beirut in 1983.
At the Third National Student Palestine Solidarity Conference
at
Ohio State University, AMJ executive
director
Khalid Turaani lied to the audience by
claiming that pogroms against Jews in Palestine never occurred, when the
historical record proves otherwise. According to an August 8, 2001
report, Turaani earlier that year attended meetings in Beirut and
Tehran where more than 400 representatives of the world’s most extreme Islamic
terror groups agreed to aside their differences and unite for jihad
against Israel and the United States. The participants included leaders of al
Qaeda, Hamas,
Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah, and militants
from Egypt, Pakistan, Jordan, Qatar, Yemen, the Sudan, and Algeria.
American Muslim Society (AMS) of the Tri-State Area: This group’s
website presents only the most benign
view of Islam, casting it as a religion that tolerates and embraces
practitioners of all faiths. "Jihad," AMS explains, "does not mean ‘holy
war.’ Literally, jihad in Arabic means to strive, struggle and exert
effort. It is a central and broad Islamic concept that includes struggle against
evil inclinations within oneself, struggle to improve the quality of life in
society, struggle in the battlefield for self-defense or fighting against
tyranny or oppression." No mention is made of what the scholar Bat Ye’or points
out is Islam’s centuries-old tradition of dealing violently with "infidels." For
non-Muslims throughout history, explains Ye’or, jihad has quite clearly
meant "war, dispossession, . . . slavery and death." "The fate of Jews in
Arabia," Ye’or writes, "foreshadowed that of all the peoples subsequently
conquered by the Arabs. The primary guiding principle was to summon the
non-Muslims to convert or accept Muslim supremacy, and, if faced with refusal,
to attack them until they submitted to Muslim domination. . . . The jihad
developed into a war of conquest whose chief aim was the conversion of infidels.
Truces were allowed, but never a lasting peace."
Though AMS turns a blind eye to examples of Muslim oppression and brutality, it has no trouble spotting what it characterizes as instances of anti-Muslim discrimination in contemporary America. The AMS website quotes Adrian College political science professor Muqtedar Khan, who says, "Rather than treating American Muslims as assets – using their knowledge of the Muslim world for diplomacy and even for intelligence – the government is treating them as suspects." According to AMS, "America’s new vulnerability [to terrorism] afflicts [Muslims] more intensely than others, since the fears of further terrorist acts are compounded by the suspicion now clouding many of their lives. The domestic antiterrorism campaign that reassures the majority of Americans is having the opposite effect on Muslims."
Arab Student Union (ASU), University of Michigan-Dearborn: This organization has
openly
endorsed the
Palestine Solidarity Movement (PSM),
which is the student arm of the
International Solidarity Movement (ISM);
ISM invites Westerners to come to the Gaza Strip and the West Bank and disrupt
the anti-terrorist activities of the Israeli Defense Forces. PSM, composed of
campus groups throughout the United States and Canada, has called on its chapter
members to pressure their respective schools "to
divest from Israel all financial holdings
until Israel ends its system of occupation and apartheid in Palestine." Favoring
the elimination of Israel from the face of the earth, PSM approves of violence,
including suicide bombings, against Israeli civilians. At PSM’s Second National
Conference, held at the
University of Michigan in October 2002,
delegates chanted "Kill
the Jews!" At the following year’s Conference, sponsored by the
Rutgers University PSM (a.k.a.
New Jersey Solidarity), conference
organizer
Charlotte Kates asked: "Why is there
something particularly horrible about ‘suicide bombing’ - except for the extreme
dedication conveyed in the resistance fighter’s willingness to use his or her
own body to fight?"
Middle East Crisis Committee (MECC): This organization describes itself as "a group of activists that organized in 1982 in New Haven, Connecticut during Israel’s invasion of Lebanon" – saying nothing to acknowledge that the invasion was in response to several years of attacks launched against Israel by terrorists based in Lebanon. MECC strongly supports the Palestinian "Right of Return," the anti-war activist Medea Benjamin of Global Exchange, and International Solidarity Movement activist Rachel Corrie, who was accidentally killed in 2003 while trying to obstruct Israeli anti-terrorist operations in Gaza.
Middle East Research and Information Project (MERIP): This organization ascribes the most recent Intifada to the anger felt by Palestinians as a result of "the daily frustrations and humiliations inflicted upon [them] in the occupied territories."
Muslim Voters of America: Uncompromising in its demand for a Palestinian "Right of Return," this organization was a signatory to an April 2004 document which read, in part: "We, the undersigned affirm the full individual and collective inalienable Right to Return of the Palestinian Arab People to their homes, property and land of origin. We assert in no uncertain terms that such a fundamental right is inviolable as it is based on the unbreakable natural belonging of a people to their property and place of origin, as enshrined in international law. Accordingly, we hold that the Palestinian Right to Return is an indispensable obligatory prerequisite for the achievement of any justice and peace. We consider any attempt to weaken, lessen, or alter such a right in any form through any proclamations or agreements between any parties to be counter to the human, political, civil, and national collective right of the Palestinian Arab People. Hence, such an attempt, along with its implications and ramifications, are null and void in total, regardless of the passage of time and the entities entering into such agreements or issuing such proclamations."
Palestine Activist Forum: This organization condemns what it calls the "ever-escalating assault on the people of Palestine" by "the murderous Israeli government [which] continues to sink to new depths of brutality with the encouragement of the Bush administration.."
Stop US Tax-funded Aid to Israel Now (SUSTAIN): Based in Washington, D.C. and presiding over more than a dozen additional chapters throughout the United States, this organization was established in late 2000. It views the United States and Israel as the primary perpetrators of evil in the modern world, stating emphatically: "We are committed to building a campaign against U.S. military and economic aid to Israel." SUSTAIN’s campaigns consist of educating the public about U.S. financial support of Israel on federal Tax-Day; taking action against the CATERPILLAR bulldozer company (to protest the Israeli Defense Force's use of that company’s equipment in the demolition of Palestinian terrorists’ homes); denouncing the construction of Israel’s security fence; and divesting from Israeli interests and corporations.
Just two weeks after the 9/11 attacks, SUSTAIN organized a
Global Justice Intifada in Washington,
D.C. Condemning what it termed "U.S. imperialism," this event made a call for
justice on behalf of "Palestinians resisting Israeli occupation" and "Iraqis
fighting genocidal sanctions." Refusing to characterize the 9/11 attacks as acts
of war against the United States, SUSTAIN describes them instead as
"criminal attacks" warranting a legal
rather than a military response. SUSTAIN’s founding member Mark Lance, a
Georgetown University professor, refers to the 1948 creation of Israel as
"the Nakba," which Palestinians
translate as "the Catastrophe." In the Spring of 2002, Lance wrote an article
titled
"Imperialism and Anti-authoritarian resistance after
9-11: Some Crucial Questions," in which he discussed his desire
to organize "solidarity" groups within the Palestinian territories and Lebanon,
while at the same time working with the terrorist organizations
Hamas and
Hezbollah. These latter two groups,
wrote Lance, "though easy to criticize from a non-authoritarian perspective,
must be understood in terms of the role [they play]. Hamas provides the majority
of social services to the people of this oppressed and overpopulated strip of
land. . . . This applies even more to the role of Hezbollah in the south of
Lebanon."
Conclusion
The American peace left is heavily populated by radical and Communist groups whose foremost ambition is to facilitate the downfall of the U.S. – by any means necessary, and through any alliances which may further that cause. And, as evidenced by the foregoing list, well represented among these groups are Muslim organizations with passionately anti-American and anti-Israel agendas. Their ally in the current war against America is radical Islam, the murderous doctrine personified by Mohammed Atta and his fellow 9/11 hijackers, and by the masterminds of 9/11 and other attacks – bin Laden, Omar Abdel Rahman, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, and many more.
How is it possible that such a seemingly unlikely alliance has been forged? After all, the Islamic radicals emphatically reject virtually everything for which the peace left claims to stand: the peaceful resolution of international conflict; respect and tolerance for other cultures and faiths; civil liberties; freedom of expression; freedom of thought; human rights; democracy; women’s rights; gay rights; and the separation of church and state. There could be no stranger bedfellows than American leftists and Islamic extremists. Yet they have been brought together by the one overriding trait they do share – their hatred for America; their belief that the U.S. is the very embodiment of evil on earth and must consequently be destroyed.
As Osama bin Laden told a CNN interviewer in 1997, "We declared jihad against America because America is unjust, criminal and tyrannical." This pronouncement does not differ at all, either in substance or tone, from the declarations of the peace left, whose sentiments are similarly detectable in the following excerpt from an al Qaeda manifesto: "America is the head of heresy in our modern world, and it leads an infidel democratic regime that is based upon separation of religion and state and on ruling the people by the people via legislating laws that contradict the way of Allah and permit what Allah has prohibited. This compels the other countries to act in accordance with the same laws in the same ways . . . and punishes any country [that rebels against these laws] by besieging it, and then by boycotting it. By so doing [America] seeks to impose on the world a religion that is not Allah’s." While the peace left makes no similar religious references, its assessments of America are essentially the same – alleging that the United States is determined to overrun other nations and dominate the world.
Radical Islam seeks purification and
social justice by means of jihad,
or holy war, whose highest ideal is martyrdom achieved while attempting to
conquer an evil worldly power such as the United States, the Great Satan (and
Israel, the Little Satan). The radical Islamist’s ultimate goal is to subdue the
"infidel" nations and therein institute sharia, or Islamic law, so as to
redeem the world for Allah. The socialist left, similarly, advocates revolution
as the means of achieving its ends – eliminating capitalism and creating a
socialist paradise on earth. Whereas Islamic radicals seek to purify the world
of heresies and of the infidels who practice them, the radical left seeks to
purify society’s collective "soul" of the vices allegedly spawned by capitalism
– those being racism, sexism, imperialism, and greed. Just as Islamic radicals
seek to impose their religion on the rest of the world in a totalitarian fashion
requiring unwavering obedience, so do radical leftists seek to create an
omnipotent socialist state that will control every aspect of daily life and will
impose a universal brand of "social
justice" on all mankind.
Central to both radical Islam and the radical left is an inclination to
overthrow the existing order by any means necessary, so as to create a paradise
on earth. This end ultimately justifies any means, and any alliance, that leads
there. American leftists may find the bigotry and intolerance of Islamic
radicals repugnant, but their desire to rid the world of U.S. "imperialism" and
capitalism overrides this revulsion and beckons them to forge the unholy
alliance. Moreover, radical American leftists practice their own brand of
bigotry and intolerance, aiming their wrath and condemnation at all who disagree
withthem.
The leftist Australian journalist John Pilger, who denounces "American imperialism" even as he praises Fidel Castro’s dictatorship, has publicly endorsed the killing of American troops in Iraq. "[T]hey’re legitimate targets," he says. "They’re illegally occupying a country." He openly supports the Iraqi resistance on the grounds that "we can’t afford to be choosy" in acquiring much-needed allies. Pilger’s sentiment perfectly expresses the governing principle of the unholy alliance; it is, as stated at the beginning of this essay, akin to the cliche, The enemy of my enemy is my friend [whoever he may be].
NOW FOR AN EXAMPLE OF A SOCIALIST TRAITOR!
January 28, 2005
A University of Colorado professor who compared the victims of the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center to Nazis has ignited protests on a college campus where he's been invited to speak.
Ward Churchill, an expert on indigenous issues and chairman of the ethnic studies program at the CU-Boulder, will take part in a panel discussion Feb. 3 at Hamilton College.
Administrators defended Churchill's appearance but admitted his views are considered "repugnant and disparaging" by many people.
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"Hamilton, like any institution committed to the free exchange of ideas, invites to its campus people of diverse opinions, often controversial," the school said in a statement issued by college spokesman Michael DeBraggio.
On Thursday, CU Interim Chancellor Phil Distefano issued a statement that said:
"I wish to make it clear that Professor Ward Churchill's views of the events of 9/11 are his own and do not represent the views of University of Colorado faculty, staff, students, administration or Regents. While I may personally find his views offensive, I also must support his right as an American citizen to hold and express his views, no matter how repugnant, as guaranteed by the First Amendment of the Constitution."
In a treatise titled, "Some People Push Back," written after the attacks, Churchill asserted the 3,000 people killed at the World Trade Center worked for "the mighty engine of profit" but chose to ignore their role.
"True enough, they were civilians of a sort," he wrote. "But innocent? Gimme a break."
Churchill went on to describe the World Trade Center victims as "little Eichmanns," a reference to Adolph Eichmann, who carried out Hitler's plan to exterminate Europe's Jews during World War II.
The invitation to Churchill has split the campus of 1,700 students, as well as the faculty.
Art history professor Steven Goldberg said it was "morally outrageous" to bring Churchill to campus. History professor Robert Paquette called it "an act of utter irresponsibility."
Jessica Miraglia, 19, a sophomore from Reading, Pa., created a poster that read: "You don't have to agree with them in order to learn from them."
Sophomore Matt Coppo, 21, lost his father, Joseph Coppo Jr., in the World Trade Center attacks, and was angered over the invitation to Churchill.
"Knowing that I'm paying for a person to disrespect my father, it doesn't go over too well in my mind," Coppo said.
THIS HYPOCRITE WOULD NOT DARE LIVE IN MUSLIM COUNTRY!
DEVOUT MUSLIMS DON'T CARE FOR LEFTIST AND THEIR IDEAS
The Unholy Alliance Turns on Its Own
By Melanie Phillips
April 26, 2005
As ye sow, shall ye reap. George Galloway is a far-Left former Labour member of the British Parliament, who was expelled from the Labour Party 18 months ago for reportedly urging Arab armies in Iraq to attack British troops. Now the Islamists he has long courted are threatening Galloway.
An enthusiast for Saddam Hussein, Galloway once flew to Baghdad and told the doubtless gratified dictator, "Sir, I salute your courage, strength and indefatigability." He has continued in this enlightened vein, vouchsafing that Saddam's foreign minister, Tariq Aziz, was a "political prisoner" who should be released.
Having been thrown out of the Labour Party, Galloway founded a new political group called "Respect," which is dominated by the Socialist Workers Party, which ran the antiwar movement in Britain. The SWP has gotten into bed with radical Islam, notably the Muslim Association of Britain, which is effectively the British wing of the Muslim Brotherhood.
Galloway has ridden this motley coalition straight into the current British general election campaign, seeking to harness the monumentally disaffected Muslim vote to give his old party a bloody nose. Under Respect’s banner, he is fighting the parliamentary seat of Bethnal Green and Bow, in the heart of London’s East End. This run-down area has always played host to immigrants. It was where many Jews settled when they arrived in London early in the 20th century. Now, more than half of its electors are Muslim. And they are furious with Tony Blair over the war in Iraq.
This has placed at risk the parliamentary career of the sitting MP, Oona King, who has earned the undying enmity of her Muslim constituents by supporting the war. King herself, however, would appear to have something in common with her tormentors: Despite being half-Jewish and half-black, she once infamously compared the Palestinians in Gaza to the Jews in the Warsaw ghetto. Bigotry, it seems, can make common cause between enemies, at least when the Jews are their common target.
King’s Muslim opponents seem to take the view that "my enemy’s enemy is my enemy." Such are the fratricidal and conflicting emotions that flourish along the axis between the Left and radical Islam. The contest in Bethnal Green and Bow now lies between the unspeakable and the unelectable.
Recently, there was a remembrance ceremony in the area to commemorate the deaths of 134 people in one block of flats — of whom the vast majority were Jews — in the last V2 missile attack of the Second World War. Young Muslims threw vegetables and eggs at those attending the ceremony, including King. These detractors subsequently expressed violent prejudice towards the Jews mourning their war dead.
Since then, King has had more eggs thrown at her and has had her tires slashed. The situation has been growing increasingly dangerous, with fears being expressed that someone might get killed.
And much of the blame is being pinned on George Galloway. King has claimed members of Respect had told local Muslims not to vote for her, because she is Jewish. Respect vehemently denied this claim and promptly threatened to sue her for libel, claiming it had "a long history of fighting anti-Semitism" – which, given its association with the Hamas-supporters of the MAB, was certainly an original boast.
Apart from the disputed issue of King’s abused ethnicity, there can be little doubt that Galloway has indeed contributed to the increasingly ugly climate in Bethnal Green and Bow. Telling Muslims that Tony Blair was waging war on their community has whipped some of the most dangerously unstable and paranoid young men in the country into a frenzy.
And having done so, he then found to his outrage that they turned their violent rage upon him. Recently, he was forced to flee for his life from some of these very same Islamists, who threatened to string him up as a false prophet. While he was electioneering in the constituency, a gang of 30 fanatics, who claim voting is un-Islamic, surrounded him and his supporters. They said they were angry at his attempt to woo Muslim voters; that they were "setting up the gallows" for Galloway; and that any Muslim who voted for his party would face a "sentence of death." After a fight broke out between the two groups, Galloway was forced to hide in his car in a back alley until the violence calmed down.
But his problems did not end there. The upstanding democrats of the militant group Hizb-ut-Tahrir, who demonstrate their commitment to moderation through their attempts to turn Great Britain into an Islamic state, declared they would sue the car-cowering politician for libel for accusing them of having instigated the attack. The Islamists said: "Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain is an Islamic intellectual and political entity that seeks to change people’s thoughts solely through intelligent discussion and debate" — a claim nearly as reassuring as Respect’s "long history of fighting anti-Semitism." It is thought that the attack was carried out, not by Hizb ut-Tahrir, but by a group called the "Saviour Sect," which only a few hours before had disrupted a meeting in London’s Central Mosque called by the mainstream Muslim Council of Britain, and levelled charges of apostasy against the Muslim Council of Britain for urging Muslims to vote.
"Gorgeous" George Galloway has not taken all this in the collegiate spirit in which it was clearly intended. He is said to have been badly shaken and very worried by the fact the people in whom he has done so much to foment violent and irrational hatred have now turned that hatred upon him.
So shaken is he that within 24 hours he was saying to Ms. King how sorry he was for what had happened to her. For her part, she said that although they disagreed about many things, they didn’t want to be violent towards each other. To this touching rapprochement, the mob on the hustings booed.
It couldn't have happened to a nicer pair. The simple lesson
for George Galloway and other appeasenik politicians is: there’s no appeasing
bigotry once that beast is roused. What this event means for the future of
once-gentle, tolerant, democratic Britain is quite another matter.
Media Take ACLU Line on
Islamic Conference
By Sherrie Gossett
May 6, 2005
"He can't talk to you about that."
The ACLU announced on April 21 that it had filed a lawsuit on behalf of five Muslim Americans who were detained near the Canadian border upon returning from an Islamic conference in Toronto. Dozens of media stories followed, depicting the "Reviving the Islamic Spirit" (RIS) conference in Canada as a harmless "religious" event featuring "mainstream" Islamic groups. In fact, the RIS conferences have featured controversial Islamic speakers and attendees "from all across the globe" and U.S. officials say such events have been used in the past to provide cover for pro-terrorist operatives.
Indeed, the RIS had previously announced the invitation of a sheikh notorious for calling for the termination of the Jews, an alleged Neo-Nazi, as well as an Islamic leader whose inaugural conference in Florida featured two suicide-bombing supporters.
Some writers and commentators, such as Daniel Pipes, a specialist on Islam, hailed the U.S. government for stopping the participants in the conference from entering the U.S. He said it was a matter of national security and protection of the homeland. Controlling the border flow, he said, is absolutely necessary and of "paramount importance." But such views were not highlighted or even mentioned in the media coverage of the controversy.
Interestingly, however, Imam Siraj Wahhaj, a controversial African-American Muslim leader, attended the recent RIS conference and returned without incident. He was a character witness for Sheik Omar Abdul Rahman, the Muslim cleric convicted of taking part in the first bombing of the World Trade Center. He ignored repeated requests to talk to AIM about his views and attendance at the RIS event. The title of his address was, "In the Spirit of Forgiveness."
The Imam of the Masjid At-Taqwa mosque in Brooklyn, New York and a board member of the Council on American-Islamic Relations and the Islamic Society of North America, Wahhaj heads the Muslim Alliance of North America. He has declared that the U.S. must accept "the Islamic agenda" and has been quoted as saying that the American government must be replaced with a caliphate, or Islamic rule. On the other hand, he appeared on the CBS 60 Minutes program to condemn the 9/11 attacks, and his website says that he has been praised by the police for his anti-drug efforts.
AIM made numerous attempts to speak with Wahaj about the detentions and his role in the conference, but was eventually told by an individual answering the phone at his mosque, "He can't talk to you about that." The individual confirmed that Wahhaj himself was not detained upon returning from the conference.
The ACLU claims that the five Muslim American plaintiffs were unlawfully detained, interrogated, fingerprinted, and photographed near Buffalo, New York, when they returned from the RIS conference in December of 2004. The lawsuit names officials with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) as defendants, and charges the defendants' actions violated the plaintiffs' right of freedom of religion, rights of free speech and assembly under the First Amendment of the United States Constitution and rights to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures under the Fourth Amendment.
The ACLU claimed that the conference was "endorsed by prominent [Canadian] politicians."
This is, in fact, true. One of those officials speaking at the conference was Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, who told the December crowd: "Let me state for the record, the RCMP will not tolerate racism and will not tolerate stereotyping. It is contrary to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. It is contrary to the internal policies of the RCMP. And it is contrary to the values of our organization. These remarks were very similar to statements Zaccardelli made at the 2003 RIS conference.
The ACLU lawsuit finds fault with the line of questioning of the plaintiffs as well. Officials allegedly asked, "What was the conference about? What did you do at the conference? Why did you attend the conference? What did the speakers discuss? Did anyone ask you to harm Americans?"
The bulk of media reports focused on the "degrading" experience which was termed a "hassle" or worse. No single media story analyzed by AIM reported the copious evidence available from public sources that Islamic conferences have been used to promote or feature groups and individuals sympathetic to terrorism and terrorist groups.
The Associated Press reported one plaintiff as saying she attended the conference to "hear respected scholars and learn more about her religion." At the border, she said, her husband was taken behind closed doors and asked "very offensive questions." The Washington Post's description of the conference was limited to "a religious conference" and the title: "Reviving the Islamic Spirit."
Deep inside the Post story, Kristi Clemens, spokeswoman for U.S. Customs and Border Protection, was quoted as saying, "In this instance, we had credible intelligence that conferences similar to the one from which these individuals were leaving were being used by terrorist organizations to fundraise and to hide the travel of terrorists themselves."
That sounds somewhat mysterious and may seem to involve classified information about terrorist threats to America. But much information about the nature of past RIS conferences is already on the public record and worrisome enough. The Post and other media did not report the following:
· RIS's 2-day conference in January 2003 advertised Sheikh Abdul Rahman Al-Sudais as a speaker. The year prior, the Associated Press reported that before 2 million followers, al-Sudais, the chief cleric of the Grand Mosque in Mecca, prayed to God to "terminate" the Jews whom he called "the scum of humanity, the rats of the world, prophet killers...pigs and monkeys." The sheikh has also characterized Jews as "evil," "evil forefathers," a "continuum of deceit," and full of "tyranny" and "treachery." Due to logistical problems, the sheikh, the 'biggest' headliner of the event, missed the conference. Jeewan Chanicka, media relations director for the Toronto conference, called the sheikh's absence "unfortunate."
· The same conference featured Zulfiqar Ali Shah as a speaker. Shah is the former president of the Islamic Circle of North America, an organization linked to Jama'at-I-Islami, a fundamentalist Pakistani group that calls Bin Laden the "hero" of the Islamic world, and raises millions of dollars for jihad around the world. Shah is currently CEO of the Universal Heritage Foundation (UHF) based in Kissimmee, Florida. I attended the inaugural conference of that group which was held just days before the Toronto conference mentioned above. The conference featured as speakers suicide-bombing supporters Abdul Malik Ali and Wagdi Ghuneim. Shah ran into some media static when the Florida press found out his headliner was advertised also to be the "terminate the Jews" sheikh.
· Mokhtar Maghroui, who spoke at the UHF conference featuring the suicide bombing supporters, also spoke at the last two RIS conferences.
· The 2003 RIS conference featured William W. Baker, who was outed as a Neo-Nazi by investigative reporter Stan Brin in the Orange County Weekly.
The major media do the public a serious disservice when they omit any account of known controversies regarding Islamist conferences. The public is left with a one-sided ACLU view when U.S. law enforcement officials take action to monitor the activities taking place. Daniel Pipes argues that, "Were the plaintiffs to prevail in this case, attending religious conferences would instantly become the favored method for terrorists and other Islamists to cross the American border without hindrance."
Livingstone blames UK policy, defends Muslim cleric
7/21/2005
Western "double standards" as well as decades of British and American interference in the oil-rich Middle East led to July 7 bombings, London Mayor Ken Livingstone said.
Mr. Livingstone told BBC radio on Wednesday that the attacks would not have taken place if Western powers left Arab states free to decide their own fate after World War I.
While denouncing the London attacks that left at least 56 killed, Mr. Livingstone said that Western countries have been interfering in the Middle East over fears of losing their fuel supplies.
"I think you've just had 80 years of western intervention into predominantly Arab lands because of the western need for oil. We've propped up unsavory governments, we've overthrown ones we didn't consider sympathetic.
"And I think the particular problem we have at the moment is that in the 1980s... the Americans recruited and trained Osama Bin Laden, taught him how to kill, to make bombs, and set him off to kill the Russians and drive them out of Afghanistan.
"They didn't give any thought to the fact that once he'd done that he might turn on his creators," he said.
The London Mayor also criticized the "double standards" by Western powers. "A lot of young people see the double standards, they see what happens in Guantanamo Bay, and they just think that there isn't a just foreign policy," he said.
"Totally unrepresentative"
Mr. Livingstone also criticized news agencies that represent British Muslims in a "totally unrepresentative" manner.
He also defended a leading Muslim cleric whom he invited to speak at a conference in Manchester next month.
Some people have alleged that Sheikh Youssef al-Qardawi encouraged "suicide bombings" and manipulated the minds of the suspected London bombers.
"What Sheikh al-Qaradawi pointed out was, given that the Palestinians do not have jet fighters and do not have tanks, they only have their bodies to use. I do not think he is actually urging people to go out and become suicide bombers," Mr. Livingstone said.
"All information I have received is that [he has] condemned the London bombings unequivocally as wholly incompatible with Islam."
Sheikh Qaradawi, also a trustee of the Oxford University Center for Islamic Studies, had strongly denounced the attacks. “We were dumbfounded by the grave news of the London bombings which killed tens and wounded hundreds of innocent people who committed no crime,” he said after the bombings.
On the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he said that it is unacceptable that Israel goes on “indiscriminately destroying homes simply because a [Palestinian] bomber came from that area. I don't believe in an eye for an eye. I don't believe in that punishment.”
Sheikh Qradawi also called for distinguishing between the Israeli occupation and the Jews themselves. “We do not fight Israelis because they are Jews, but because they took our land, killed our children and profaned our holy places,” he said.
Islamic and Communist Violence Mars India’s Independence Day
Webcast News Service
15 August 2005
Violence marred India's Independence Day celebrations in both the north and the south of the country as communists killed ten people in Andhra Pradesh and bombs blamed on Islamic terrorists exploded in Kashmir. The attacks came as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh promised to boost economic growth to fight poverty.
Hours after Singh promised his people a better future, communists in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh shot and killed a regional lawmaker and several other people as they were returning home from a ceremony marking Independence Day. Communists have been waging a three-decade long campaign of terrorism in the southern state.
In the Kashmir region, a small bomb exploded outside a stadium in the summer capital Srinagar, where official celebrations were due to be held. Another bomb exploded in Pattan town. Islamic terrorist groups fighting Indian rule in the disputed region claimed responsibility for planting the devices. No one was injured in the attacks.
India celebrates Independence Day, the day it became free from British rule in 1947, with nationwide ceremonies and parades. Terrorist groups often carry out violent attacks.
The main celebrations are held in New Delhi, where the Indian Prime Minister addressed the country from the heavily-guarded ramparts of the historic Red Fort.
Speaking on the occasion Monday, the Prime Minister said peace talks with Pakistan had achieved some success, but urged Islamabad to end its support for Islamic terrorists in Kashmir.
He said Pakistan had stopped some of the activities of terrorists operating from its soil, but half-hearted efforts would not lead to success. He called on Islamabad to cut off all support to terrorists. Singh warned that India's response would be "hard" if violence in Kashmir did not end.
Singh also promised to keep India on the path of high economic growth to ensure prosperity for all.
The prime minister said that if the momentum of high growth was maintained in the coming decade, India would be able to eliminate poverty, ignorance, hunger and disease. He said he expected the country to achieve seven percent growth this year.
The Wonders of the Liberal Mind
Mugged by Leftist
Anti-Semitism
By
Nick Cohen
October 11, 2005
On the Saturday of the great anti-war demonstration of 2003, I watched one million people march through London, then sat down to write for the Observer. I pointed out that the march organisers represented a merger of far left and far right: Islamic fundamentalists shoulder to shoulder with George Galloway, the Socialist Workers Party and every other creepy admirer of totalitarianism this side of North Korea. Be careful, I said. Saddam Hussein's Iraq has spewed out predatory armies and corpses for decades. If you're going to advocate a policy that would keep a fascist dictator in power, you should at least talk to his victims, whose number included socialists, communists and liberals - good people, rather like you.