Author: Joel Mowbray
Publication: The Washington Times
Date: March 17, 2004
URL: http://www.washtimes.com/op-ed/20040316-085118-1135r.htm
Appearing on Fox News recently, the spokesman
for the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), Ibrahim Hooper, said
that in 20 years worth of trips to mosques, "I've never heard violence
preached; I've never heard anti-Semitism or anti-Americanism preached."
When asked in a subsequent phone interview
with this columnist if his statement also holds true for any Muslim events,
conferences and rallies he has attended, Mr. Hooper said it did and added,
"In fact, if I had heard that I would have called them on the carpet
and asked them why they're saying such hate-filled, divisive things."
(In a follow-up conversation, Mr. Hooper said he did "not include rallies.")
Mr. Hooper's claims, however, are somewhere
between disingenuous and just plain dishonest.
At a now-infamous Washington rally on Oct.
28, 2000, then-president of the American Muslim Federation Abdurahman Alamoudi
shouted to a cheering crowd, "We are all supporters of Hamas." In
the second phone interview, Mr. Hooper acknowledged being there but claims
he did not hear Mr. Alamoudi.
In the media frenzy that followed, though,
neither CAIR nor Mr. Hooper publicly criticized Mr. Alamoudi's avowed support
of the terrorist organization.
Less than a year later, Mr. Hooper joined
roughly a dozen leaders of various Muslim groups in staging a "sit in"
in front of the State Department in June 2001. During the event, American
Muslim Council Director Ali Ramadan Abu Zakouk "preached violence"
by labeling the mass murder of innocent civilians in suicide bombing attacks
as a "God-given right."
"The question of resistance to occupation
is a God-given right. And the occupied people can use any means possible for
them. They have no limitation," Mr. Zakouk explained. Mr. Hooper was
listed as the contact person for the press release sent out in advance of
the "sit in," though he first claimed he "did not remember"
and later that he "did not hear" Mr. Zakouk's defense of suicide
bombings.
Videotape footage of the event (provided by
the Investigative Project), however, clearly shows Mr. Hooper standing barely
a few feet behind Mr. Zakouk as the comments were made.
Without video or a published record noting
his participation, it is impossible to know what other pro-violence, anti-American
or anti-Semitic propaganda Mr. Hooper has personally witnessed. But there
are plenty of examples of reprehensible rhetoric spouted either by CAIR officials
or at CAIR co-sponsored events - any of which Mr. Hooper, as longtime CAIR
spokesman, would almost surely be aware of.
At the Islamic Association of Palestine's
third annual convention in Chicago in November 1999, CAIR President Omar Ahmad
gave a speech at a youth session praising suicide bombers who "kill themselves
for Islam." "Fighting for freedom, fighting for Islam - that is
not suicide. They kill themselves for Islam, " he said.
The executive director of CAIR's New York
chapter has made similar comments that would likewise fall under the heading
of "violence preached." At an interfaith event shortly after September
11, CAIR-NY's Ghazi Khankan started with the obligatory disclaimer that "those
who attack civilians are wrong," but then he explained that any Israeli
adult was a "soldier" and thus not a civilian.
Mr. Khankan rationalized as follows: "Anyone
over 18 is automatically inducted into the service and they are all reserves.
Therefore, Hamas, in my opinion, looks at them as part of the military."
Driving home the point that it's OK to blow up any Israeli adult, Mr. Khankan
added, "Those who are below 18 should not be attacked." (When asked
about this speech - but not being told who gave it - Mr. Hooper said, "I
condemn it.")
CAIR co-sponsored a May 1998 New York conference
titled, "Palestine: 50 Years of Occupation," where one of the guest
speakers taught participants a song that included lyrics: "No to the
Jews, descendants of the apes."
Mr. Hooper insists that CAIR was not a co-sponsor
of the event and added, "I don't even know if that happened." But
an e-mail sent out to a Muslim e-mail list the day before the event clearly
identifies CAIR as one of the 11 co-sponsors - and audiotape of the conference
(provided by the Investigative Project) recorded the anti-Semitic song.
Even when given the opportunity by journalists
to "call on the carpet" designated terrorist organizations, Mr.
Hooper demurs.
When asked by The Washington Post in November
2001 if he would condemn Hamas and Islamic Jihad, Mr. Hooper responded, "It's
not our job to go around denouncing." Asked by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
in February 2002 to condemn Hamas and Hezbollah, Mr. Hooper called such questions
a "game" and explained, "We're not in the business of condemning."
Asked in an America-Online-sponsored chat
in August 1998 who was responsible - the terrorists or America - for the East
Africa embassy bombings, Mr. Hooper wrote that, although he condemned the
bombings, "a great deal of what happened is responsible due to misunderstandings
on both sides."
When it comes to "misunderstandings,"
though, Mr. Hooper's record leaves none as to whether or not he has heard
or directly knows of plenty of violence and anti-Semitism preached by Muslim
leaders.
