Obama sides
with Islamic group over FBI 'The opposite
direction of trying to stamp out terrorism' by Garth Kant
WASHINGTON – Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., had a succinct
analysis of the Obama administration’s latest diplomatic move and how it
appeared to conflict with FBI’s own assessment.
“The president is going exactly in the opposite direction of
trying to stamp out terrorism,” she told WND upon hearing why Obama
administration officials had huddled earlier in the week with representatives
from the Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR, and the Muslim
American Society, or MAS.
According to a statement on CAIR’s website, representatives
from the two U.S.-based Islamic groups met with senior government officials on
December 22, and pledged to work together to counter a decision by the United
Arab Emirates, or UAE, on November 15, to put CAIR and MAS on its list of
foreign terrorist groups.
The UAE also outlawed the two organizations and declared
CAIR and MAS to be front groups for the terrorist organization the Muslim
Brotherhood.
The FBI severed contacts with CAIR
in 2009 as “not
an appropriate liaison partner”
for the bureau because of evidence linking the group and its founders to Hamas,
which the U.S. lists as a terrorist organization. Hamas runs Gaza and was
founded as an offshoot of the jihadist organization the Muslim Brotherhood,
based in Egypt.
“It’s interesting that the administration has parted ways
with it’s own position and is now meeting with a U.S. court designated
co-conspirator of terrorist financing,” observed Bachmann.
Federal prosecutors named CAIR an unindicted co-conspirator
in the Holy Land Foundation trial over a plot to fund Hamas. In November 2008,
in the biggest terrorism financing trial in U.S. history, Holy Land Foundation
members were convicted of sending millions of dollars to Hamas.
Justice Department prosecutors implicated CAIR and other prominent
Islamic organizations in the U.S. in the conspiracy and said they had acted at
the direction of the Muslim Brotherhood to support terrorism.
Furthermore, as WND reported in
2007, CAIR was a spinoff of the defunct
Islamic Association for Palestine, launched by Hamas leader Mousa Abu Marzook
and former university professor Sami al-Arian, who pleaded guilty in 2006 to
conspiracy to provide services to Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Several CAIR
staffers have been convicted on terrorism-related charges and CAIR founder Omar
Ahmad allegedly told a group of Muslims
they are in America not to assimilate but to help assert Islam’s rule over the
country.
Nonetheless, on Monday, State Department spokesman Jeff
Rathke said, “The United States does not consider these U.S. organizations
(CAIR and MAS) to be terrorist organizations” and had asked the UAE for more
information on the decision.
When a reporter noted the head of CAIR has been a White
House guest and frequently visits the State Department, Rathke claimed CAIR was
just one of many “faith-based groups” which had met with U.S. government
officials.
“They obviously feel that the heat is off and once again are
meeting with unindicted co-conspirators,” said Bachmann. The congresswoman said
she had no doubt that CAIR was a front group for jihadis because of all the
evidence cited in the bill
she introduced calling on the Obama administration to declare the Muslim
Brotherhood a foreign terrorist organization.
“CAIR is a front group for the Muslim Brotherhood in the
United States, as is the Muslim Student Association, and they try to present a
storefront view of moderate, mainstream Muslim thought when, in fact, they are
just the opposite.”
On it’s website, CAIR calls itself: “America’s largest
Muslim civil liberties and advocacy organization. Its mission is to enhance the
understanding of Islam, encourage dialogue, protect civil liberties, empower
American Muslims, and build coalitions that promote justice and mutual
understanding.”
However, CAIR is cited several times in the text of the
Muslim Brotherhood Terrorist Designation Act as a Brotherhood-controlled
entity.
“They (CAIR) tend to be the mask covering up violent jihad
across the globe. They pretend to be the mouthpiece of moderation when, in
fact, they are anything but,” said Bachmann.
For its part, CAIR described its terrorist designation by
the UAE as “shocking and bizarre.”
Indeed, why would the UAE do such a thing when its own
ambassador has praised CAIR in the past and the country has allowed the group
to raise funds there?
Daniel Pipes, president of the
Middle East Forum, suggests it has little
to do with terrorism and a lot to do with UAE leaders seeking to protect their
own skin.
He notes the fracturing of the Islamist movement in recent
years includes a divide between the Muslim Brotherhood and the Persian Gulf
monarchies, including the UAE.
Pipes said those monarchies now see a threat to their
existence from the Muslim Brotherhood, “as they do Hamas and its progeny —
including CAIR.”
Even though she is retiring from Congress, Bachmann’s bill
to designate the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization is still alive and
had 20 co-sponsors, at last count. She believes someone else will lead the
effort and the bill will make it to the president’s desk because of the
ever-increasing threat from Islamic jihad to the U.S. and the world. If so,
Obama is expected to veto the measure.
As
WND has reported, the bill would not only add the
Muslim Brotherhood and its U.S. subsidiaries to the U.S. list of foreign
terrorist organizations, it would also crack down on anyone in America who
provides material support or funding to the Brotherhood or its front groups. At
the same time, the bill proposes denying visas to any Brotherhood members
seeking to enter the U.S., while deporting any foreign nationals associated
with the Brotherhood already living in the U.S.
Additionally, the bill states: “Any United States financial
institution that knowingly has possession of or control over funds in which the
Muslim Brotherhood or its affiliates, associated groups, or agents have an
interest shall retain possession of or control over the funds and report the
funds to the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the Department of the
Treasury.”
In effect, the law would freeze Muslim Brotherhood assets
and dry up funding and recruiting for Brotherhood groups operating in the U.S.
If aggressively enforced, the law would go a long way toward shutting down the
subversive infrastructure the Egypt-based Brotherhood has spent the past 40
years building in America.
The Obama administration does not support such action,
because it views the Brotherhood as a nonviolent political group and has
engaged its leaders at home and abroad. But former FBI agent John Guandolo, who
helped draft the anti-Brotherhood bill, said the administration’s view is
ill-informed.
The bureau’s foremost expert on the Brotherhood network,
Guandolo helped uncover a Brotherhood conspiracy to overthrow the United States
by “civilization jihad” following a raid on a suspected terrorist’s home in
Northern Virginia.
Author of “Raising a Jihadi Generation: Understanding the
Muslim Brotherhood Movement in America,” the veteran agent warns that “America
faces an insurgency inside our homeland” from the Brotherhood. “This is an
enemy who is cunning, patient, well-supported and well-organized,” he said.
Guandolo said he is pleased to see other countries recognizing the threat from
the Brotherhood and its front groups, such as CAIR. “Since [CAIR leaders] are
Hamas,” he said, “it is nice to see that at least the UAE recognizes the
implications that this makes CAIR a terrorist organization.”
Guandolo said the Muslim American Society, or MAS, moreover,
was founded by three senior Muslim Brotherhood members in the U.S. in the early
1990s, including the leader of the Brotherhood in America at the time, Ahmed
Elkadi. MAS also runs jihad camps for Muslim youth throughout the U.S.
He says there is overwhelming documentary and testimonial
evidence proving “CAIR and MAS are jihadi organizations – they are
terrorists.”However, Guandano says Attorney General Eric Holder pulled the plug
on FBI investigations into the groups for “political reasons.”
Follow Garth Kant @DCgarth
Source:http://www.wnd.com/2014/12/obama-sides-with-islamic-group-over-fbi/
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