Top Obama Aide Shares Platform With Rabid Anti Semite

I recently read an excellent article over at the    Investigative Project On Terrorism   and the good folk there have kindly said I can re-post some of it here. It’s an important story – do read and then share this information. And do visit the IPT’s superb site!

The article details how one of Obama’s top aides cheerfully shared a platform with people promoting Jihad, Anti semitism, homophobia, and Islamic terrorism. This is an abbreviated version of the original piece; the extra emphasis in italics and colour are mine:

 

A top aide to President Barack Obama provided a keynote address at last weekend’s 46th Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) national convention, a gathering that attracted thousands of people and also featured anti-Semitic, homophobic rhetoric and defense of the terrorist group Hezbollah.

In her remarks, Senior Advisor for Public Engagement and International Affairs Valerie Jarrett noted she was the first White House official to address ISNA. She spoke in general terms about interfaith dialogue and cooperation. She praised her hosts for “the diversity of American organizations, and ideas that are represented and will be debated” at the convention.

And she openly invited ISNA President Ingrid Mattson to work on the White House Council on Women and Girls that Jarrett leads.

The ISNA is an unindicted co-conspirator in a Hamas-support conspiracy and maintains significant leadership ties to its foundation 28 years ago by members of the Muslim Brotherhood in America. A more pointed statement also would have stood as a powerful retort to extremist sentiments offered in other segments of the conference.

While many panels featured criticism of U.S. policy and law enforcement, one stood out for its hate-filled rhetoric, and ISNA officials should have seen it coming a mile away. During a “meet the authors” session, Imam Warith Deen Umar, former head of the New York state prison chaplain program managed to:

Argue that key Obama aides are “Israeli,” proving Jews “have control of the world.”

Malign the motives of Jews active in the Civil Rights movement.

Portray the Holocaust as punishment of Jews for being “serially disobedient to Allah.”Insinuate that Hurricane Katrina was a result of tolerance for homosexuality.

 

Umar’s radicalism is no secret. He previously hailed the 9/11 hijackers as martyrs who were secretly admired by Muslims. He has called for violent jihad. In a January 2004 speech, he urged people:

“Rise up and fight. And fight them until turmoil is no more and strike terror into their hearts. You think there is no terror in Quran? It’s called [word unclear] read it in the 56th Surah of the Quran. There’s no lack of translation, there’s no mistranslation There’s not one Sheikh says one thing, no, it’s very clear. When you fight, you strike terror into the heart of the disbeliever.'”

 

He has a website promoting a past book, Judaiology, which features an excerpt describing “the inordinacy of Jewish power.” Jews, he wrote, are “an amazing people who can steal you blind as you watch. If you discover the theft, they can put you to sleep. If you wake up to them, they can put you back to sleep with mind games, tricks of fancy, smoke screens, and magic. Henry Ford almost uncovered them.”

 

Other choice comments of his included:

“It’s against the laws of Allah and against the laws of the Bible for homosexuality. And if you think the Quran talks about harsh punishment from Allah, you should read what the Bible says. I don’t have the time to go into it, but it’s in my book. The Bible is very hard on, he says, Allah says that the land itself is doomed. You wonder why things are happening in America are going to happen? You think that Katrina was just a blow of wind?”

And also:

“My conclusion is that there should be more jihad,” he said. “But people don’t want to hear that. They’re scared.”

 

This is the man responsible for the Muslim chaplain program in New York prisons for 20 years. He was forced out of that job after his praise for the 9/11 hijackers became known. This is who ISNA chose to showcase in a “meet the authors” panel and provide an unchallenged platform for.

 

Umar shared the microphone with another author who did not spew out bigotry, but who did cast Hezbollah as an innocent player.  Cathy Sultan described her book, Tragedy in South Lebanon: The Israeli/Hezbollah War of 2006, as a history of “the tragedy of the repeated incursions and wars in South Lebanon, the complexities of the Lebanese politics.”

She made no mention of Iranian funding for Hezbollah or Syrian meddling in Lebanese politics or its suspected involvement in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. Nor did Sultan describe indiscriminate Hezbollah rocket fire toward Israeli civilian communities, or the cross-border attack on an Israeli army base by Hezbollah that left three soldiers dead and two others kidnapped.

In response to a question, Sultan said: “Hezbollah still serves a role. I think that Lebanon is still under constant threat from its southern neighbor. And I see nothing wrong, as long as Hezbollah abides by certain rules and regulations; I see no reason why Hezbollah should not remained armed.”

The United States considers Hezbollah to be a terrorist group, and some experts consider it a bigger potential threat to the United States than Al-Qaeda.

The panel did not feature anyone with contrasting viewpoints to challenge Sultan or Umar. The program drew about 50 people, who sat passively during most of the remarks.

Umar’s books were available for purchase at the convention. Government agencies were represented with booths of their own, including the departments of Justice, State, Homeland Security, Commerce, the U.S. Navy and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).

 

In Cairo, Barack Obama said:

“Threatening Israel with destruction — or repeating vile stereotypes about Jews — is deeply wrong and a hindrance to peace.”

But somehow, partnering with a group that invites the same thing is okay?

 

 

With thanks to the Investigative Project On Terrorism for allowing me to re-post this material.

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The Dhimmi In The White House Protects Saudi Arabia – From families of 9/11 Victims

Reed it and weep, people:

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court has refused to allow victims of the Sept. 11 attacks to pursue lawsuits against Saudi Arabia and four of its princes over charitable donations that were allegedly funneled to al-Qaida.

The court, in an order Monday, is leaving in place the ruling of a federal appeals court that the country and the princes are protected by sovereign immunity, which generally means that foreign countries can’t be sued in American courts.

The Obama administration had angered some victims and families by urging the justices to pass up the case. In their appeal, the more than 6,000 plaintiffs said the government’s court brief filed in early June was an “apparent effort to appease a sometime ally” just before President Barack Obama’s visit to Saudi Arabia.

At issue were obstacles in American law to suing foreign governments and their officials as well as the extent to which people can be held financially responsible for acts of terrorism committed by others.

The appeal was filed by relatives of victims killed in the attacks and thousands of people who were injured, as well as businesses and governments that sustained property damage and other losses.

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York previously upheld a federal judge’s ruling throwing out the lawsuits. The appeals court said the defendants were protected by sovereign immunity and the plaintiffs would need to prove that the princes engaged in intentional actions aimed at U.S. residents.

In their appeal to the high court, both sides cited the report of the Sept. 11 Commission. The victims noted that the report said Saudi Arabia had long been considered the primary source of al-Qaida funding. The Saudis’ court filing, however, pointed out that the commission “found no evidence that the Saudi government as an institution or senior Saudi officials individually funded the organization.”

The victims’ lawsuits claim that the defendants gave money to charities in order to funnel it to terrorist organizations that were behind the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

The appeal also stressed that federal appeals courts have reached conflicting decisions about when foreign governments and their officials can be sued.

The case is Federal Insurance Co. v. Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, 08-640.

Saudi Arabia: Obama’s New Best Friend

 

IN a move that has stunned the relatives of the 9/11 victims, Barack Obama has petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to protect Saudi Arabia and four Saudi princes from being held accountable for their role in the 9/11 terror attacks

The Obama administration has asked that the Saudis be held immune under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, or FSIA.   The move has outraged the families of the 9/11 victims, as there is plenty of evidence of complicity by the Saudi government and the named princes in support of al-Queda’s attack.
While the FSIA generally protects a sovereign state, there are exceptions under which its provisions can be invoked. Such interpretations are left largely to the courts to determine.
Families of the 9/11 victims have expressed outrage over the Obama administration’s filing.

In its recent friend-of-the-court brief filed with the U.S. Supreme Court in “Federal Insurance Co. vs. Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,” the Obama administration asked the court to deny a petition for a “writ of certiorari,” or higher court hearing, by the families of the victims of 9/11 in their effort to sue Saudi Arabia and its princes.

In the original case filed in 2006, the families of the 9/11 victims allege Saudi Arabia and four Saudi princes acting in their capacity as high-level government officials and as individuals made donations to charitable organizations with the knowledge that the charities were diverting funds to al-Queda. In response, the Saudi government invoked the FSIA as a basis to preclude a lawsuit by the 9/11 victims’ families.

In August 2008, the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the 2006 ruling by U.S. District Judge Richard Casey in dismissing the claim against Saudi Arabia. The dismissal covered the four princes, a Saudi banker and a Saudi charity. In addition, the appeals court said that the exceptions to immunity didn’t apply since the State Department had not designated Saudi Arabia as a state sponsor of terrorism.

There appears, however, to be a possible conflict in what the FSIA allows and a portion of a U.S. statute [28USC1605(a)] which states, in effect, that a foreign state shall not be immune from the jurisdiction of U.S. courts if the attack and funding for it occurred in the U.S.

 

Fifteen of the 19 terrorists who hijacked U.S. aircraft and crashed them into the World Trade Center and Pentagon on 9/11 were from Saudi Arabia and were affiliated with al-Queda. Intelligence and past actions link the Saudi government and the four princes with al-Queda.

Peter Leitner, who has assisted terror victims’ families successfully in suing terrorist organizations for the past 12 years, stated: “In effect, the U.S. Government announced its opposition to allowing 9/11 victims and their families full access to the U.S. legal system in (the government’s) effort to protect Saudi Arabia and its princes from being held accountable for their role in the attack on the United States.”

“As power of Attorney for the family and estate of John P. O’Neill, former FBI (counter-terrorism) expert, I find it disgusting that the Obama administration has spat in the faces of these victims just as (Obama) prepares to leave for Egypt and Saudi Arabia while advocating for the closing of (the U.S. Guantanamo prison in Cuba) and giving full access to the U.S. court system to the terrorists currently imprisoned there,” he added.