Friday, December 30, 2011

Yes, CAIR’s Terrorist Ties Are Real



By John Tabin
…CAIR’s sympathy for terrorists, and its ties to them, are extensive, well-documented, and yes, they have resulted in charges (and convictions). In 2004, when CAIR tried to bully David Frum and the National Post, among others in Canada and the US, into ignoring this, From threw the stubborn facts back at them:
CAIR was founded in 1994 by alumni of an older group, the Islamic Association for Palestine. The IAP, founded by senior Hamas figure Mousa Mohammed Abu Marzook, calls for the destruction of Israel and the creation of an Islamic state under Islamic law in Israel’s place. (In 1996, CAIR would condemn the U.S. government’s decision to deport Marzook as an “anti-Islamic” act.)
CAIR’s first executive director, Nihad Awad, publicly declared himself a supporter of Hamas at a 1994 forum at Barry University in Florida.
One of CAIR’s original advisory board members, Siraj Wahhaj, served as a character witness for Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman. Rahman is the blind Egyptian cleric convicted in 1995 of conspiracy to bomb New York landmarks. CAIR described Rahman’s conviction as a hate crime.
CAIR’s founding chairman, Omar Ahmed, also an IAP alumnus, is said to have declared at a public event in California in July, 1998: “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.” Ahmed has since disputed the accuracy of the quote–five years after it was reported by a California newspaper.
After the 9/11 attacks on the United States, CAIR’s Web site featured a link titled, “Donate to the NY/DC Disaster Relief Fund.” The link connected to the Web site of the Holy Land Foundation, a charity closed down by the United States three months later as a Hamas front…
Since 9/11, three CAIR associates in the U.S. have been indicted on terrorism-related charges.
In September, 2003, CAIR community relations director Bassem K. Khafagi, pleaded guilty on immigration and bank-fraud charges, in Detroit. Khafagi interestingly co-owned a print shop with another man who has since been charged with illegally sending goods into Iraq.
Randall Todd Royer, a communications specialist at CAIR’s Washington headquarters, pleaded guilty in January, 2004, to belonging to the Kashmiri Lashkar-i-Taibi terrorist group and illegally acquiring firearms and explosives in order to train for terrorist missions against India. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison.
A founding member of CAIR’s Texas chapter, Ghassen Elashi, was convicted of conspiracy and money-laundering charges in connection with the shipment of high-technology items to Syria and Libya in July, 2004…