The White House at the ADAMS Islamic Center

In a concerted attempt to stay on message in attacking the Homeland Security Committee hearings on radicalization of Muslims, on March 6 the White House put out the same message being pushed by radical leftist Max Blumenthal, pseudo-conservative Muslim Brotherhood associate Suhail Khan, and others in the red-green alliance.  They sent Deputy National Security Advisor Denis McDonough to speak at the ADAMS (All Dulles Area Muslim Society) mosque in Sterling, Virginia to politicize and undermine the Committee’s hearings.  Sticking to the script, McDonough argued against linking Islamic Jihad doctrine with Jihadist terrorism: “For example, we know there are many different reasons why individuals – from many different faiths – succumb to terrorist ideologies… we risk feeding the very feelings of disenchantment that may push some members of that community to violent extremism.”  In other words merely thinking and speaking about the threat of  Jihad is itself the cause of the rising tide of Jihadist “violent extremism.”

McDonough’s choice of the ADAMS Islamic Center for his speech was an endorsement of the Muslim Brotherhood: the ADAMS Executive Director Mohammad Majid is also President of the Muslim Brotherhood-founded Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terrorism finance trial.  In other words, the Deputy National Security Advisor’s choice of venue was a symbolic repudiation of the Department of Justice prosecutors’ successful convictions in the Holy Land Foundation trial of 2008.

CAIR at the ADAMS Islamic Center

On May 27, 2007 the ADAMS Center hosted Executive Director Nihad Awad of the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) to discuss the FBI, hate crimes statistics and Muslims, to an audience he had thought was entirely Muslim.  Unknown to Awad, audio of the event was provided to the Center for Security Policy.  Awad’s 2007 speech began with complaints about the greater number of hates crimes reported against Jewish victims versus the “very very small percentage” reported against Muslim victims, because it made his job harder as a lobbyist on Capitol Hill:

The Department of Justice, in their annual report; don’t be surprised that if you feel that Muslims are not treated well in the country, that the numbers of reports of discrimination against Muslims or hate crimes is very low.  While maybe the number of discrimination cases and hate crime cases for example against the Jewish community is very very high. Maybe dozens or few hundreds by Muslims, but maybe by Jews are in the thousands.  But when you examine the situation you say, “Well, we feel our community is really more targeted.  Almost 54% – this is one of CAIR’s surveys – 54% of Muslims who were surveyed at one point, they said they had been subject to discrimination.  54% which if you put numbers down and statistics, we’re talking about tens of thousands of cases, not dozens, as is reported in the Justice Department’s annual report.

So there’s a huge gap between where we are as a community and underreporting what goes on, and how we are perceived.  So we go to Congress, and testify before Congress, our claim and our statement is weak, because a fair-minded Congressman will ask the question, “How many cases are we talking about?”  Well, we’re talking about a few hundred cases.  You give the specifics, and here’s an annual report by CAIR.  How many cases are we talking about, well maybe 2,000 cases.  How many Muslims do we have in the United States?  Well, we have 7 million.  So if you divide 2,000 over 7 million, that’s a very small small percentage.

Which means Muslims are in good shape.  Muslims are not treated badly.  But if you ask Muslims, average Muslims, “How are you doing?” most Muslims nationwide, they will tell you an experience with discrimination.  My interaction with Muslims nationwide tells me that most Muslims I know have encountered an incident or an experience with discrimination or mistreatment, whether subtly or directly.  But when we ask, have you contacted a civil rights organization like CAIR, the answer is “No.”  Why?  And this is very interesting.  They will say, “Well, what can you do?”

Awad went on to advise Muslims to be wary of the FBI and not talk to them except in the presence of a lawyer:

For example, when we advise them not to speak to FBI agents when if they are approached except with the presence of lawyers.  Many people take that as a good advice, but they don’t apply it. Also, we remind people that it is very important to cooperate with the government and law enforcement [UNCLEAR] except you have to be very careful that you have rights.  These rights are constitutional and you cherish your rights.  Many people I know, know these things but in personal application, they don’t do it.  So, for example, our organization, [UNCLEAR] in a professional capacity. And I know [UNCLEAR] and others do the same thing.  In a professional capacity, we sit down and we discuss issues. We bring complaints.  And we ask what have you done for this group, what have you done for that?  Let’s move forward.  [UNCLEAR] knocks on their doors, this is different in relationship—when you get a knock on your door, you have to be more cautious.  You have to be more careful. Because everything you say can be used against you even if you by mistake give false information, that’s criminal.  And it is a crime.

If someone is asking question, for example, “three hours ago, where were you?” And if you give the wrong answer, even innocently that’s considered, technically, false information.  And that false information can get you [UNCLEAR] into jail.  So in the presence of a lawyer, that [UNCLEAR] legal person puts you on the right track.  So you deliver your responsibilities toward law enforcement. But at the same time, you are very careful.  Cause some people are nervous. Sometimes they don’t—they don’t know what they mean.  And they may land on the ear of the law enforcement as “uh-oh, something’s fishy here.”  And they have to say something and have to do something.  I know many people who make sometimes stupid jokes.  They want just maybe to deflect the attention that they’re anxious or they’re nervous or they’re afraid, so they throw a joke here and there.  They don’t mean it.  But to the sensitive eye of law enforcement, that is maybe sign of a crime or a criminal or terrorism or a potential suspect that I’m talking to.  And sometimes it goes downhill.  And people are not trained.  So what we do is we tell the community members that we have to be proud, we have to understand the law, be confident, and if you have something—if you have done something  wrong, there is a way to deal with it.  And if you did not do anything wrong, you should be very confident and don’t get yourself in trouble, you know, by saying unwise things.

Awad’s 2007 speech focused on the then-recent “Flying Imams” case in which six Imams were ejected from a U.S. Airways flight for suspicious behavior.  At the time, Representative King had introduced an amendment to a bill that would protect “John Does” who reported suspicious terrorist-related activity from retaliatory legal suits.  Awad spoke forcefully for the right to sue these average citizens who reported suspicious behavior, which would deter potential whistle-blowers and leave our nation more vulnerable to terrorist attack.  He then launched into an attack on King calling him an “extremist” in Congress:

It was wrong then, and it is wrong today.  Today you have people like Peter King, a Republican Congressman, in the Congress, who after we filed the lawsuit on behalf of the imams, issued a bill, protecting “John Does,” regular passengers, from being sued, if they, falsely even, falsely claim that a Muslim is suspect and has to be removed from the plane because they are praying, and so on and so forth. And he has some supporters in the Congress, to muddy the waters of this lawsuit, but luckily there are good people in Congress, including the Chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, Mr. Thompson,  Bennie Thompson who said, “Let’s debate this issue, because in this country we cannot discriminate against people.”  If people report, in good faith, then they should not be prosecuted, they should not be sued.  But if people report rashly, and because of prejudice and hatred, then the victims of this should have legal recourse, and should be able to fight this discrimination, because we are still, we are a nation of laws.  We cannot allow this discrimination just to go, under the disguise of, you know, national security.

Also, we support that when you see something, you say something, but also we have to fight people who when they don’t see something, they say something.  And that’s what this lawsuit is about.  People who do not say something… who do not see something, but they see color, but they see Muslims, they see Arabs, they see people of different backgrounds, they don’t like them, they can just launch a false report to security agencies, and they just get you in trouble.

In addition to promoting the intimidation of whistle-blowing “John Does,” Awad complained about the speech rights afforded to Americans under the 1st Amendment: “There is a limit, and I think there are many lawyers who are looking into this.”

The imams are going after those who caused this for them, that particular incident.  The imams also have the right to sue the media, if the media misrepresented them, and that misrepresentation caused them harm.  So this is like almost the first round.  There could be second and third round.  And there is a statute of limitations for defamation of one year.  So until November 20th… December… I mean November 20th, 2007, they have the right to sue any party that misrepresented them, or defamed them.  But the laws of defamation in the United States are much more difficult, its like the most liberal laws, you can say almost whatever you want in this country, unlike the law in Canada.  There are strict and tough defamation laws, if you accuse someone, if you say something about some people.  You can be sued, or you can go to jail, or you will be fined.  In the United States, people use free speech, 1st amendment, to justify what they say.  But there is a limit, and I think there are many lawyers who are looking into this, but the plain focus for the imams now, is to have legal recourse against those who caused them immediate harm, they were rejected, uh… they were mistreated, they were arrested, and they were denied service.  And that all triggered the defamation against them, their families, their pasts, and their associations.

In summation, the Obama administration, leftist journalists and domestic Islamists are trying hard to sell a complete inversion of reality, in which those who attempt to investigate Shariah-driven Jihad are labeled “instigators of violent extremism.”  In this strange universe, any frank discussion about Shariah-adherent Islam and the Jihad it inspires is itself the primary provocation that causes “violent extremism.”

Sun Tzu’s immortal advice about “knowing ones enemy” comes to mind.  If you cannot investigate your enemy, nor even identify him by name, how can you possibly fight him?  The Jihadists and their useful idiots in the United States are creating a “Catch-22” for anyone who dares question their conventional wisdom about the roots of so-called “violent extremism.”  Let us hope that Peter King’s hearings are the first step in breaking this vicious cycle of obfuscation, dissimulation and outright lies so we can finally name and investigate our enemies, and at long last get down to the serious business of confronting them.