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Clinton Call on Obama's Speech Includes Jihad Advocate - Update

As we reported on June 4, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's office held a conference call with various American Muslims immediately after President Obama's Islamic outreach speech in Cairo. Among those invited to participate was former Muslim American Society (MAS) President Esam Omeish, who lost in his bid to become a Virginia State Delegate just days after the State Department phone call.

It is now clear that the State Department knows about Omeish's controversial background. In a June 10 State Department Bureau of International Information Programs section, there is a "press guidance" relating to "Muslims: Department of State criterion in choosing Muslim American contacts/leaders."

This press guidance appears to be linked to possible questions that may have been asked about the conference call. There is the anticipated question, "What is Department of State's criterion in choosing/identifying Muslim American contacts/leaders?"

The State Department answer:

• The Department meets with a wide range of American citizens and domestic groups who have an interest in United States foreign policy.

• We do so to hear a diverse number of opinions as well as to explain our policies to American citizens.

• We value hearing all opinions, whether people agree with U.S policies or not.

And if that generic answer was insufficient for inquiring reporters:

(IF PRESSED)
• This call was designed to amplify the President's speech in Cairo. A general invitation was issued by the Bureau of Public Affairs to a large list of groups we have interacted with over many years. While I will not discuss the specifics of any one group or individual, Americans' have the right to free speech, protected by the constitution.
Background for Briefer: Esam Omeish was invited by the PA/PIL to participate in a conference call designed to amplify the President's speech in Cairo. This call was for Arab and Muslim Americans, Mr. Omeish is listed as a, "Doctor and Former President of the Muslim American Society (MAS)." The American Israeli Public Affairs Committee was also included on the call and may have raised concerns about Mr. Omeish.
Mr. Omeish is a candidate for representative of Virginia's 35th District to the State House, and a doctor at Northern Virginain (sic) Community Hospital. In 2007, he had to resign from the Virginia Commission on Immigration due to comments he made regarding "Israel's war machine" during the 2006 Israel-Hizballah conflict. He is also accused of supporting suicide attacks and violence in achieving a Palestinian state.
Mr. Mahdi Bray, MAS Executive Director, could not be on the call, Mr. Omeish took his place.

The State Department knew about Omeish's support for violent jihad, yet he was still included in the post-speech forum. Also revealing is that Omeish was not the State Department's first choice. MAS executive director Mahdi Bray, a multiple convicted federal felon, con-man, thief and drug abuser, "could not be on the call" and Omeish "took his place."

Are jihad supporters and convicted felons the partners of choice for Secretary Clinton in her "outreach" efforts into the American Muslim community?

By IPT News  |  Thu, 2 Jul 2009 at 3:14 PM  |  Permalink  |  Comments (1)

Somali Indictment in the Works?

It looks as if the FBI's investigation into what's behind the disappearance of more than 20 Somali men from the Minneapolis area has resulted in at least one indictment. Fox News reporter Mike Levine reports at least three people have been indicted and one may already be in custody:

"Among those charged is a man from Minneapolis who went to war-torn Somalia and then, about four months ago, relocated to Seattle, according to the two sources and a leader in the Minneapolis Somali community. The man was then arrested in a Seattle airport and transferred to a jail in Minneapolis, where he is currently being detained, according to the law enforcement sources.

The law enforcement sources said the man, described as in his 20s, has been charged with providing material support to a terrorist group, in this case al-Shabaab, which has been warring with the moderate Somali government since 2006."

Some of the men have returned from Somalia, but law enforcement officials indicate they don't believe the men. One of the men who disappeared from Minneapolis, Shirwa Ahmed, died in a suicide bombing in Somalia that killed dozens of people.

Relatives of many of the missing men have cooperated with the investigation.

Levine quotes Omar Jamal, executive director of the Somali Justice Advocacy Center in St. Paul, Minn., expressing his relief that charges may be pending:

"What we have is human trafficking. Those Somali boys were being trafficked for a war."

About 50 members of the Minneapolis Somali community protested outside a Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) ice cream social last month, saying CAIR was discouraging cooperation with the investigation.

By IPT News  |  Thu, 2 Jul 2009 at 9:28 AM  |  Permalink  |  Comments (0)

In Sharia Courts, "Death Threat" Helps Keep British Muslims in Line

The use of Sharia courts – those driven by Islamic law - in Great Britain is far more widespread than previously believed, and it raises troubling questions about human rights and equal protection under the law, according to a new study by Civitas, an independent British think-tank.

Five Sharia courts – in London, Manchester, Birmingham, Bradford, and Nuneaton -- are generally acknowledged to exist in the country today. But Civitas researchers found that there are another 85 such courts operating largely out of mosques. The study concludes that such courts or tribunals are issuing rulings that breach basic principles of British law and calls for removal of their formal legal recognition under Arbitration Act 1996 (c. 23), one of the nation's most important legal statutes.

"The reality is that for many Muslims, Sharia courts are part of an institutionalised atmosphere of intimidation backed by the ultimate sanction of a death threat," Civitas Director David Green writes in an introduction to the report. "It cannot be accepted that Sharia councils are nothing more than independent arbitrators guided by faith." The reality, Green adds, "is that for many Muslims, Sharia courts are part of an institutionalised atmosphere of intimidation backed by the ultimate sanction of a death threat."

One major problem is that Sharia reflects the practices of male-dominated Asian and Arabic cultures, while Britain's legal system provides for equal rights under the law regardless of race, religion, or gender. Because Sharia court records are not widely available, it is difficult (if not impossible) to obtain information about specific cases and rulings. So the report examines fatwas put on popular online sites by Islamic religious leaders to get an idea of what Sharia courts are up to. The report concludes that their rulings "walk a very fine line between legality and illegality," adding that "If put into practice, they would undermine UK law by allowing a single community to play fast and loose with British law and customs."

According to Civitas, some of the rulings "advise illegal actions" and others "transgress human rights standards as they are applied by British courts." For example: A Muslim woman should not have fertility treatment; she may not under any circumstances marry a non-Muslim man unless he converts to Islam; and she may be coerced by her husband into having sex. Moreover, a man can divorce his wife without telling her about it (so long as he does not attempt to sleep with her) and he is permitted to have up to four wives. Other examples include: Sharia must override the judgments of British courts; taking up residence in a non-Muslim country is generally forbidden; and a Muslim attorney must act contrary to British law where it contradicts Sharia.

Learn more about the Civitas study and efforts to impose Sharia law in Britain here and here and here.

By IPT News  |  Wed, 1 Jul 2009 at 5:52 PM  |  Permalink  |  Comments (0)

Islamic Saudi Academy Grad Held Without Bail After Trying to Board Plane With 7-Inch Blade

A Saudi Arabian man living in Tampa is being held without bond after being arrested June 4 for attempting to board a US Airways flight carrying a concealed weapon. Raed Abdul-Rahman Alsaif was trying to fly to Phoenix.

According to a criminal complaint by Gregory J. Mertiz, Special Agent with the Transportation Security Administration in Tampa, Alsaif submitted three bags for screening to TSA officers. A Transportation Security Officer saw a large butcher knife inside one of the bags. The knife was "artfully concealed between the outside fabric and the expandable pull handles of the bag," the complaint said, and the weapon was stored in a way that would have been "accessible to him [Alsaif] in flight."

Alsaif initially was arrested for violating state concealed weapon laws. He told police a friend gave him the bag and he didn't know there was a knife inside it. Police questioned the friend, who said that the bag wasn't his and that he had not given Alsaif a bag or a knife.

Raed Alsaif is a 2003 graduate of the Islamic Saudi Academy (ISA) in Alexandria, Virginia, the same high school that was the subject of a report in June 2008 by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) which alleged that ISA was using radical Saudi textbooks. According to the report, passages in the textbooks used at ISA justify violent actions and intolerance to the reader including killing Christians, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, apostates (converts from Islam) and adulterers. School officials say they have deleted the offending passages.

In 2003, the same year that Alsaif graduated from ISA, Ahmed Omar Abu Ali, a U.S. citizen and ISA graduate and valedictorian was arrested in Medina, Saudi Arabia on terrorism related charges. In 2005, Ali was convicted on nine counts including providing material resources to Al-Qaeda and conspiracy to assassinate President George W. Bush. He was sentenced to 30 years in prison.

Alsaif has been previously arrested on drug charges and driving without a license in Hillsborough County.

In addition to his current concealed weapon charges, authorities found that Alsaif has been living in the country illegally. Alsaif had been a University of Tampa student, but was dismissed for poor academic performance in May 2009. Alsaif failed to file a timely appeal for his dismissal. As detailed in Alsaif's Order of Detention, he is now in violation of his student visa and subject to deportation. The court document also claimed that there are reasons to believe that Alsaif "has not been entirely candid since his arrest."

By IPT News  |  Tue, 30 Jun 2009 at 2:11 PM  |  Permalink  |  Comments (1)

Court Ruling Cuts off Saudi 9/11 Litigation

Saudi Arabia and four of its princes are immune from 9/11-related civil litigation after Monday's U.S. Supreme Court decision not to take up an appeal of a lower court decision that ruled against 9/11 families. The move keeps intact a ruling by New York's 2nd District Court of Appeals dismissing the lawsuits. In a statement, attorneys for the family of the FBI's former New York Executive Agent in Charge John O'Neill, who died at the World Trade Center, expressed disappointment at the ruling:

"We note, however, that there are still cases pending in the lower courts against other sovereign nations unaffected by the Supreme Court's ruling.

We note, too, that there are still cases pending against other defendants seeking to hold them accountable for their actions in assisting Al Qaeda."

Earlier Monday, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported on a government report which found a Saudi-financed charity, the Saudi High Commission, helped supply weapons to the Somali warlord responsible for killing 18 U.S. soldiers in the 1993 Black Hawk Down battle. According to the Inquirer:

"The Saudi Arabian High Commission has received humanitarian supplies from Sudan and Iraq; however the crates from the Sudan and Iraq have also contained military weapons, ammunition and supplies, usually hidden in false bottom containers," the intelligence report said.

The intelligence document does not make clear when the arms shipments took place or whether the weapons were employed in the Mogadishu battle. It also warned that its findings were raw, 'not finally evaluated intelligence.'"

The Defense Intelligence Agency report has been in the public domain since 1997, the Federation of American Scientists obtained it through a Freedom of Information Act Request. Read the memo here.

By IPT News  |  Mon, 29 Jun 2009 at 6:08 PM  |  Permalink  |  Comments (0)

CNN on Megahed...by the Numbers

CNN ran a report Monday about Youssef Megahed, the Egyptian resident alien and former University of South Florida student (where convicted terror supporter Sami Al-Arian was once a professor and the current leader of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Ramadan Shallah, also taught). Megahed was acquitted in U.S. District Court in Tampa of federal explosives charges stemming from an ill-fated road trip to South Carolina with an associate who pled guilty to providing material support to terrorists. After Megahed's acquittal, the Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Tampa took Megahed into custody and charged him with removal (deportation) violations, ostensibly on terrorism/security related violations that are believed to rely on evidence related to his criminal case, even though he was not convicted.

As reported by the IPT in April and again in June, Megahed's supporters and apologists argue Megahed is being treated unfairly. Some even claim the immigration case amounts to double jeopardy. The law, however, is clear. Deportation proceedings are civil/administrative in nature, not criminal, and foreign nationals (aliens) in the United States may be subject to removal based on a lesser standard of evidence than "beyond a reasonable doubt" in criminal cases, even if the evidence is very similar.

There is no double jeopardy. This process is not used by the government frequently and a decision to proceed requires significant review by high-ranking officials within DHS, sometimes in consultation with the Department of Justice.

Today's CNN article contained 55 paragraphs. Of those, only five reflected the U.S. Government's position in the case. The rest of the article describe Megahed's "plight" and how the former foreman of Megahed's criminal case jury traveled to the Florida detention center to personally visit with Megahed and his family.

The network report did identify a few facts that are worth noting, including that a government search of a computer found at Megahed's residence found "numerous videos, documents and an internet search history that supports Islamic extremism, jihad against the United States..." Also, CNN quotes a former Miami U.S. Attorney as saying, "The government doesn't use this a lot, but I think this is an arrow in the quiver that needs to stay because there are those cases where the government needs to do everything in its power to keep us safe, from some of those same individuals." Also, Guy Lewis states, "In one context, the real question is, are you going to jail for a long time. The other context is, are you going to get to live among us?"

The other 50 paragraphs clearly side with Megahed.

By IPT News  |  Mon, 29 Jun 2009 at 4:56 PM  |  Permalink  |  Comments (0)

Maine Fines Group for Allegedly "Inflammatory" Mailing on Muslim School Program

The state of Maine is fining the Christian Action Network (CAN) $4,000 for mailings the state considers to include an "inflammatory anti-Muslim message."

The fines are based on two regulatory violations that CAN denies committing.

"These bogus charges and fines the State of Maine has imposed are nothing but an attempt to stifle our free speech and silence our organization from speaking out about the steady creep of radical Islam in America," CAN president Martin Mawyer told Patrick Poole at Pajamas Media. "We fully intend to appeal the state's penalties because if they successfully silence us here, we will quickly find that we won't be able to speak out anywhere."

At issue is a mailing CAN sent to state residents urging them to protest petition Maine's governor against proposed school curriculum that could require "students to pray to Allah, dress up as Muslims, adopt Muslim names, and learn the five pillars of Islam." Similar exercises for other religions are not a part of the program.

Poole didn't get far trying to get state officials to specify what was inflammatory about the mailing. But, he said part of the fine is rooted in CAN's lack of a proper registration for the mailing and the unsanctioned use of Gov. John Baldacci's name. CAN denies the allegations.

Given the screeds that fly around during a political campaign, it's difficult to imagine how Maine's action makes any sense. Read Poole's full report here.

By IPT News  |  Fri, 26 Jun 2009 at 6:57 PM  |  Permalink  |  Comments (0)

NYPD: Hizballah More Dangerous Than Al Qaeda

Hizballah has greater capability than Al Qaeda of staging a mass-casualty terrorist attack in the United States, according to a top New York Police Department (NYPD) official.

"Hizballah at the strategic level, with its state sponsors, more or less decided not to attack the United States' interest directly in the continental United States at all," NYPD Deputy Commissioner for Counterterrorism Richard Falkenrath said Tuesday. "But our assessment is, if they ever change their minds, they have the capacity to inflict terrible damage on the United States, and I worry about that a lot. We haven't seen it yet, but I don't like to be in a position where our defense lies in the strategic decision of a terrorist organization."

In remarks to the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Falkenrath added that he had seen strategic analyses of what could persuade Hizballah to alter its strategic decision not to attack the United States. Falkenrath said those would include "direct U.S. military operations against the Hizballah leadership" as well as attacks against Iran, the terror group's state sponsor.

Hizballah has focused its terrorist actions abroad because "they would have too much heat on them if they did attack the United States, and they can accomplish most of their interests without it," Falkenrath said.

Read more about Falkenrath's remarks here.

By IPT News  |  Fri, 26 Jun 2009 at 4:50 PM  |  Permalink  |  Comments (0)

New Jersey Resident Heads To Prison For Aiding Hizballah

A federal judge on Tuesday sentenced New Jersey resident Saleh Elahwal to 17 months in prison for providing material support to the terrorist organization Hizballah. Elahwal pled guilty in December to aiding the broadcasts of Al-Manar, a Hizballah-operated television channel which produces hate programming like this.

Elahwal's attorney, Edward Sapone, seemed relieved at the sentence and acknowledged that providing satellite access and technological help to a terrorist organization like Hizballah is not activity protected by the First Amendment.

In December Elahwal admitted that during 2005 and 2006 he helped provide satellite transmission services for Al-Manar. Elahwal and co-conspirator Javed Iqbal received $112,000 from Al-Manar through HDTV Limited, a Brooklyn company they operated. Iqbal also pleaded guilty in December to providing material support to Hizballah and was sentenced to 69 months in prison. Read more about Elahwal and Iqbal's guilty pleas here.

Read more about Hizballah's longstanding efforts to raise money and smuggle weapons from the United States here and here.

By IPT News  |  Thu, 25 Jun 2009 at 7:17 PM  |  Permalink  |  Comments (0)

Khamenei Outs Obama's Pre-Election Letter

The Washington Times scores a scoop today with confirmation that President Obama sent a letter to Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei before the June 12 elections seeking what a source told the newspaper was "cooperation in regional and bilateral relations" and a resolution of the dispute over Iran's nuclear program.

Khamenei actually referenced the letter in his sermon last Friday in which he ominously affirmed the results of the disputed re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and threatened protestors with a harsh response, notes reporter Barbara Slavin. She cites this translation:

"On the one hand, they [the Obama administration] write a letter to us to express their respect for the Islamic Republic and for re-establishment of ties, and on the other hand they make these remarks. Which one of these remarks are we supposed to believe? Inside the country, their agents were activated. Vandalism started. Sabotaging and setting fires on the streets started. Some shops were looted. They wanted to create chaos. Public security was violated. The violators are not the public or the supporters of the candidates. They are the ill-wishers, mercenaries and agents of the Western intelligence services and the Zionists."

As Caroline Glick notes, that's not even close to the craziest thing Khamenei said. But you wouldn't know the extent of it from media coverage.

"The [New York] Times did not mention that Khamenei ascribed world events to a Zionist conspiracy which he believes controls the US. It similarly failed to mention his long rant against the US for the FBI's 1993 raid on David Koresh's Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas.

Had the Times - and other major media outlets - properly reported Khamenei's speech, they would have made clear to their readers that he is not a rational thinker. His view of world events is deeply distorted by his hatreds and prejudices and paranoia."

There's a spirited debate over the wisdom of Obama's outreach to Iran. Slavin's article concludes with an assessment from Iran expert Patrick Clawson, who said the President's tougher language Tuesday is a sign even Obama knows that if they ever existed, "the prospects for a successful engagement are declining."

By IPT News  |  Wed, 24 Jun 2009 at 2:02 PM  |  Permalink  |  Comments (0)

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