In today's lead piece at FrontPage, I discuss Al-Arian's guilty plea, and those who have egg on their faces because of it (news links in the original):
After years of denial, Sami Al-Arian has finally admitted it: he has pleaded guilty to a charge of “conspiracy to make or receive contributions of funds to or for the benefit of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a Specially Designated Terrorist” organization. He has agreed to accept deportation. In his 2002 defense of Al-Arian, Eric Boehlert wrote: “The al-Arian story reveals what happens when journalists, abandoning their role as unbiased observers, lead an ignorant, alarmist crusade against suspicious foreigners who in a time of war don't have the power of the press or public sympathy to fight back.” Reality is just the opposite. The al-Arian story reveals what happens when journalists and Leftist academics, abandoning their role as unbiased observers, lead an ignorant, alarmist crusade against Americans who in a time of war try to defend our country from those whose politics make them the darlings of the Leftist media and academic establishment.Al-Arian’s guilty plea is a dizzying turnaround from last December 6, when the former University of South Florida professor was acquitted on eight of seventeen terror-related charges. At that time, Linda Moreno, an attorney for Al-Arian, exulted: “This was a political prosecution from the start, and I think the jury realized that.” The acquittal appeared to vindicate the many journalists and academics who had maintained Al-Arian’s innocence for so long. Chief among them was Boehlert, whose January 2002 article was entitled “The prime-time smearing of Sami Al-Arian: By pandering to anti-Arab hysteria, NBC, Fox News, Media General and Clear Channel radio disgraced themselves -- and ruined an innocent professor’s life.” Then there was John Esposito, director of Georgetown University’s Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding and author of numerous apologetic books about Islam. In a letter to Dr. Judy Genshaft, President of the University of South Florida, after she fired Al-Arian, Esposito reminded her that “the University did a thorough independent review several years ago which found no merit in accusations made at that time” and worried that Al-Arian was merely falling victim to “anti-Arab and anti-Muslim bigotry.”
Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times also likely felt vindicated. In March 2002 he went to bat for Al-Arian, portraying him as a Gandhi behind bars, a victimized absent-minded professor: “The point is not whether one agrees with Professor Al-Arian, a rumpled academic with a salt-and-pepper beard who is harshly critical of Israel (and also of repressive Arab countries) — but who also denounces terrorism, promotes inter-faith services with Jews and Christians, and led students at his Islamic school to a memorial service after 9/11 where they all sang ‘God Bless America.’ No, the larger point is that a university, even a country, becomes sterile when people are too intimidated to say things out of the mainstream.” Al-Arian’s detractors, not his defenders, were the ones who were supposed to be intimidated into silence.Will Kristof now apologize? Will Boehlert? Esposito? Al-Arian’s attorney Linda Moreno, who was so quick in December to charge the government with political motives in prosecuting Al-Arian, on February 28 signed Al-Arian’s plea agreement. The agreement leaves no room for doubt: “Defendant is pleading guilty because defendant is in fact guilty. The defendant certifies that the defendant does hereby admit that the facts set forth below [in the plea agreement] are true, and were this case to go to trial, the United States would be able to prove those specific facts and others beyond a reasonable doubt.” What’s more, Al-Arian acknowledged that he was “pleading guilty freely and voluntarily…and without threats, force, intimidation, or coercion of any kind.” But in speaking to reporters after Al-Arian signed the agreement, Moreno acknowledged only that “In the agreement, he did not plead guilty to any crime of violence, and by pleading he gave his family closure in this ordeal.”
What of Al-Arian’s myriad other defenders? Some backpedaling and track-covering has already begun. At the Free Sami Al-Arian website, statements made in Al-Arian’s defense by groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union and the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, readable as late as Tuesday morning, are no longer accessible. The Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), however, was ready to concede nothing. CAIR-Florida’s Ahmed Bedier, in flat contradiction of the agreement that Al-Arian actually signed, declared: “The decision not to retry Dr. Al-Arian is proof that the prosecution lacked the necessary evidence to secure a conviction in this case.” Diving deeper into fantasyland, Bedier insisted: “There was also a report somewhere, earlier today in some media, that the, uh, guilty plea, one of the guilty plea, that he agreed to a lesser charge of some sort of conspiracy. We have confirmed that that is false. There is no plea to any sort of conspiracy to support terrorism at all.” A press release from CAIR’s national office disingenuously neglected to identify the “lesser charge” to which Al-Arian pled guilty, and echoed Linda Moreno in noting that “the government conceded in the agreement that there were no acts of violence committed by Al-Arian.”
But this is a distinction without a difference, and a canny attempt by both Moreno and CAIR to imply that what Al-Arian has now admitted to having done was somehow innocuous. If Al-Arian was aiding the group, and the group was killing Israeli civilians, then Al-Arian was aiding in those murders. After all, Al-Arian stood by approvingly at one Islamic conference while former Cleveland Imam Fawaz Damra (himself now also deported) tried to raise money for Islamic Jihad by saying: “Donate to the Islamic Jihad. Nidal Zalooum from the Islamic Jihad held a dagger and stabbed four of the Jews in the courtyard of Al-Haram Al-Qudsi….One of them would leave his house with a knife to stab the Jews -- twelve Jews -- after the events of the Gulf War. Brothers, the Intifadah calls you. Five hundred dollars! Who would add to five hundred dollars?”
Moreover, it is clear that the former professor holds to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s ideology of Islamic supremacism and the destruction of Israel. That ideology is inseparable from the larger aspirations of the global mujahedin, who strive ultimately to impose Sharia upon the Islamic world and then the non-Muslim world – and to commit acts of violence to that end. Al-Arian’s guilty plea and deportation thus constitute a significant setback for the subversive, soft jihad that the mujahedin have been waging in the West, largely (but not solely) by financing jihad activities elsewhere in the world under religious and academic cover.
Paul Perez, U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Florida, put it succinctly: “Al-Arian has now confessed to helping terrorists do their work from his base here in the United States -- a base he is no longer able to maintain.” He is unable to maintain that base today no thanks to CAIR, Nicholas Kristof, Eric Boehlert, John Esposito, and numerous other pillars of today’s academic and journalistic elites – elites which Al-Arian’s guilty plea have been shown once again to be thoroughly, irredeemably corrupt.
you named the media correctly, they assume this so called moderate muslim must be innocent, they assume he has been signalted out because he is a muslim, and that the courts were wrong to trial him! l wonder what bs will come out now that he has confessed to his involvement with terrorists groups..
This morning on Current, the Al Gore TV channel, there was a piece of a category they call "raw intel." People on the scene shoot footage, then submit it to the channel. Earlier pieces had extensive footage both of the French car-torching jihad, and of the Australian beach riots. Lacking in those two pieces was context--the car torching was just scary, and the Aussies were all racist yobs. In both cases, I don't think the intent was to slant the coverage, but without the context, the simple pictures fail to convey the story in its entirety.
This morning the piece showed the bombed cafe in Tel Aviv. It started with the rescuers at work, and contained a number of charged images--mothers watching, covering the eyes of their children; a boy, perhaps eight to ten years old, calling into the blast area for "Dad, Dad!" as security restrained him; a statement from a bystander about how the murderer was stopped by security, who wanted to know what was in the bag he was carrying; a woman being rushed out on a stretcher, most of her clothes having been literally blown off by the explosion; numerous other wounded being treated, though none were visibly maimed.
The piece then cut away to a PIJ representative on a shady street, making a statement that this was a logical result of Israeli aggression, etc. A Hamas thug made a similar statement. Erekaat (sic) delivered his talking point about the tragedy of failed negotiations, etc. An Israeli flak asked, is this what Hamas really wants, or now that they are in power are they going to develop reasonable goals, because if all they want is the destruction of Israel, that will go unsatisfied. Finally, the piece concluded with the murderer's taped message, clearly stating that he was in the path of Jihad in the name of Allah, etc. Not a mention of Israel, interestingly. Some clips of him awkwardly handling an AK-47, looking like the boy he was handling a man's weapon.
The piece is also available on the Current website, I recommend your readers watch it. But I am also suggesting that, since Current TV is meant to be a viewer created channel (their logo is VC squared, for viewer created content), and I have seen them run several pro-Christian pieces (for example, missionaries in China, Christian activists rescuing North Korean refugees from China), I think there is considerable room for the media savvy readers of this group, or LGF, to submit pieces for Current. For example, the SUV attack in North Carolina would make an excellent 7-minute piece (their target length is 4 to 7 minutes) if it linked the driver's statements to their Koranic and traditional origins. Likewise, a piece like the Czech reporter did, visiting a mosque and comparing the difference between the for-public rhetoric and the just-between-us-Muslims discussions, would sting (Laura Mansfield has written up such encounters, but the impact would be so much greater on film). The anti-Copt riots in Alexandria would be an excellent subject, as would the earlier massacres of the Sudanese Christians in exile in Alexandria. I'm only scratching the surface, but folks, there is great education potential here, and while I lack the savvy to exploit it, someone here must be able to get the ball rolling.
BTW, what prompted this was the "coincidence" of al-Arian's confession to having supported PIJ without hurting anyone, and the murderous PIJ bombing in Tel Aviv.
Esposito is now partly in the pay, direct or indirect, of a foreign power: Saudi Arabia. Esposito has been a friend and admiring colleague of, inter alia, Azzam Tamimi, a supporter of Hamas and declared would-be suicide bomber. Esposito was a friend of the late Prof. Farooqi, the "Palestinian" professor stabbed to death by an over-enthusiastic student. Esposito is a stout defender of that stout defender of suicide bombings, and of the murder of homosexuals, and of so much else, Sheikh Al-Qaradawi. And when there is a trial of someone accused of terrorism, as Sami al-Arian, there is a good chance, as happened here, that a warm letter of endorseement will come from -- John Esposito.
Yet he was the opening (and main) speaker at a conference sponsored by Cardozo Law School; he may no longer be an adviser to presidents, as he was under the negligent shallow crowd-pleasing Clinton, but he is still called up by the odd lazy journalist. His coffee-table books (lots of pictures of turbans and tulips, and blue mosques) are still printed by Oxford University Press), he is still not regarded with the contempt and suspicion he deserves from all Infidels.
We know all the reasons why he receives so many invitations from grateful Muslims, and we know how highly he is thought of (well, actually no doubt he is actually thought of with secret contempt by real Muslim apparatchiki, but that's another matter) in the ministries of propaganda of the Kingdom of "Saudi" Arabia and by the ghost of Bin Baz.
But do not his declared sympathies, his connections, his words and deeds and silences, all add up to something akin to those who were sympathizers with the Communists in, say, 1953, during the Cold War, or with the Nazis in 1939 or 1941? The only difference is that the ideology of Islam is not seen by our political leaders, or even where seen is not demonstrated to be, a belief-system teaching endless and often murderous hostility to all Infidels, and at the very least the need to have Islam eventually dominate everywhere so that those Infidels, if they wish to escape death or conversion, will have to accept a system of permanent humiliation, degradation, and physical insecurity.
Timidity, cupidity, stupdity -- the Esdrujula Explanation -- surely all these tell us why our leaders have, with a few remarkable exceptions, begun to speak sensibly, unconfusedly, about the ideology of Islam. And until they do, the espositos of this world will not be treated, will not enter the language, as the quislings to the West, to the idea and the ideals of the West, that some of us believe them to be.
It never ceases to amaze me how little responsibility journalists are willing to accept in situations such as this. Sure, they may have egg on their face today, but it's unlikely to be the first time it's happened nor will it change the way they approach a similar story in the future. It's because of this lack of accountability that we have to search long and hard to find unbiased reporting. If it does, in fact, exist.
On a related note:
http://www.freesamialarian.com
Hah. Free Sami, indeed. Way to sugarcoat this latest turn of events...
Commenting on lurker's post about VCC, I'd be interested in knowing what the heck is really said in local muslim mosques around the local area. I for one see way too many mosques in maryland area and is usually curious.
Re: Al-Arian: Guilty as Charged
Islam is a religion of intolerance and Al-Arian is a bigot whose "Islamaphobia" act has been canceled. It's amazing how these guys who hate the USA fight (kicking and screaming) to stay in America. Most other places on earth have to build walls (in one way or another) to keep people in but we have a build walls to keep them out or we will have half the planet here in no time at all.
A Russian customer of mine once said, "America is like a big garbage can. Everybody who wants to get rid of citizens they don't like sends them to America. But somehow it works." He's right.
Al-Arian will either regret what he has done or he will blame America even more for his intolerance and deceit.
Is the MSM in UK finally waking up? Will the people take any notice? Just found this piece in London Times Online
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2142403_1,00.html
Given the current "Iran Crisis" you'd expect this to be headline news on every BBC bulletin.
Ha!
At least the US has finally acted against Al-Arian. How long before UK/Eurabia acts?
Kate
Al-Arian is a selfish, self-absorbed bastard. He allows himself the opportunity to think of the needs of 'his' family - 'to bring closure' to 'his family' (spit) . . . to avoid the frustration of further exposure of his blood-lust guilt surfacing for all to see.
Of course 'his family' will no longer suffer separation from him or experience the continued intense examination of their ferocious, grisly and hostile belief system.
Yes, he will be deported, perhaps to a hate-friendly domain where he'll likely continue his unfettered support and financing for his execrable diabolist's, (aka Mo's) bloody wet dreams. . . all at the expense of every infidel and every infidel's 'family'.
In Canada our Wing of CAIR has jumped to the defense of a few suspected terrorists, but as these guys become guilty from CAIR demanded transparency by the RCMP and CSIS , CAIR distances itself by failing to cover the story or claim they aren't "TRUE" Muslims .
BTW, out of the 5 Muslims held on Security Certificates for possible terror links through forged papers and bogus ID's , none were Citizens and ergo....were Security risks.
CAIR portrayed them as landed immigrants or Citizens and Muslims were calling radio shows and claiming they heard Muslims were being rounded up or grabbed off the streets and held without charges.
Oddly though, CAIR-Can just dropped their law Suit against 2 Canadians in the Media that were alleged to have defamed them and Islam , the settlement didn't deny the claim of terrorism support or funding, it just implied the claims weren't proven and the Party's settled.
Sheema Khan from CAIR ( AKA Con-job Khan) testified at a Islamophobia inquiry but an astute
Governemnt Lawyer shucked that clam and got her to admit she was complicite in BOGUS statistics on Racism and Islamophobia by taking less than 600 solicited website claims of anti-Muslim feelings with almost ZERO follow-ups to confirm the bigotry or Citizenship of the whiner.
CAIR lied about the Islamophobia after the 9/11 attack and managed to aid in creating anti-racism Workshops for public schools to indoctrine non-Muslims with the Quran and Islam.
I found a link to a Government balance sheet that listed about $300,000.00 for Muslim Org.s to employ people and run the Workshops.
WOW, and all this time CAIR demanded keeping religion out of the public schools.
Anti-Moslem bigotry?
Now, let me get this straight. Islam is the greatest surge of bigotry in world history, and, given that Islam is a form of organized bigotry, wouldn't this supposed anti-Moslem bigotry of which the egregious Esposito speaks thereby anti-bigotry bigotry, if such a thing is possible?
Re Prof. Ismail al-Farouqi, the mentor of John Esposito, he was a district governor, appointed by the British authorities, in part of "mandatory Palestine." If I am wrong, somebody please let me know.
In 1969, I believe, while staying in the American city of Philadelphia, I heard dear Professor Farouqi discourse on Jewish and Arab history in a lecture he gave at Temple University. This was shortly after the Iraqi govt had hung eleven [or maybe 15] men, including nine Jews, I believe, on the charge of spying. The Iraqi govt left their bodies to swing in the wind in a public square for the greater delectation of the public. The occasion was much enjoyed by all, almost.
In his lecture, Farouqi did not refer to the hangings, but questioners mentioned them. He was annoyed by the questions, as one might assume. To a question about Arab Judeophobia [or something of that nature], Farouqi responded rather self-righteously, in the tone of a good man whose benevolence has been rejected: "If we had wanted to kill you, we could have wiped you out in the time of Muhammad." Muhammad was kindness and liberalism personified: We could have done it but we didn't. It is interesting that Farouqi identified himself and the contemporary Arabs with Muhammad and his deeds 1350 years before. This is the curious Muslim view of time as a continuum going in both directions, and the continuing relevance of ancient events, real or imagined, for today.
Meanwhile, as we spends billions dickering on ungrateful bastards in Iraq, and millions dickering on putting Sami away, I note the sickening slaughter is spreading out from Darfur, into Chad. Nick Kristoff had a piece recently on this, but there is a pretty good piece on Yahoo News today. It looks pretty grim.
Our infrastructure lays in ruins, gas at 3 plus, oil soaring, as all this is happening, we wait(with baited breath) for, "Iraq to stand up, so we can stand down." Meanwhile, we are impotent to do anything about Iran or Darfur, or even to stray from Dhimmitude on the Dannish Cartoon issue since we have 100,000 plus Americans as virtual hostages in Iraq. And those sickening corrupt Kurds, Shias and Sunnis, kill each other off(and us on slow days). Talk about Nero.
Hi guys!!
It seems Jihad Watch has missed the boat again. Who cares about Al-Arian that piece of mohamedan filth is old news. This is HOT HOT HOT off the wire.
Please see link below. It tells me that there are some people in the world, with a-lot of influence, with too much time on their hands OR that they are really reall really really bloody stupid!!!
Can anyone say LUDICROUS???
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/london/4926114.stm
Shunkleash (PBUH)
Shunkleash: Nope, it's over at Dhimmiwatch.
http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/011111.php
You can print it out and read it on the privy. Facing any direction you like. :)
Eliyahu posted: "If we had wanted to kill you, we could have wiped you out in the time of Muhammad." Muhammad was kindness and liberalism personified:
Interesting. This same excuse was posted by a muslim a few weeks ago, on either JW/DW, and for the same reason. Muslims seem to get their ready made answers from some central repository. No independent thought, just the usual guff.
It's amazing how these guys who hate the USA fight (kicking and screaming) to stay in America.
I gotta disagree with you on this one, Frank. They must stay here, otherwise, how is America gonna achieve full Sharia?
Muslims seem to get their ready made answers from some central repository...
You are so wrong, DP. The Moslems get their ready-made answers from a loosely couled network of mosques. They just seem coordinated because of the literal commandments taken from the Koran and the various Sunnah books.
Sorta. Since WWII the mosques have been augmented by a loosely couple network of Western universities(i.e.,Marxist professors and various academic frauds), agencies of permanent government (e.g., the US State Dept., the CIA, etc.), and the MSM (e.g., Tim Russert).
wouldn't this supposed anti-Moslem bigotry of which the egregious Esposito speaks thereby anti-bigotry bigotry, if such a thing is possible? -APF
Naw, that's just typical anti-anti-bigotry bigotry bigotry.
“anti-Arab and anti-Muslim bigotry.”
Can you imagine anyone during World War II accusing someone of Anti-German and Anti-Nazi bigotry?
This nation of ours had better start catching a fat clue and realize that enemies come in all guises, and just because someone believes in a religion does NOT mean that suddenly they are benign and peaceful and wonderful, delusion manifested by our easily misguided protection of is it just anreligious freedoms. I do not think that any of the Founding Fathers would have been dumb enough to embrace Islam in this country and they are rolling in their graves everytime some Marxist reporter grandstands to protect men like Al-Arian. Most of the grandstanding (but not all) is done out of utter ignorance of the facts and if it wasn't for sites like Jihad Watch, so few open discussions would exist on these subjects that we'd all have to start questioning if we really do live in a free society or just the illusion of one.
'Arab' has nothing to do with it!!
Islam is the Enemy.
edit: delusion manifested by our easily misguided protection of religious freedoms.
(and I have no idea how that garbled text go in there...)
No doubt the Islamoapologists will still be saying that he was fitted up.