Spencer: CAIR Finally Under Investigation

Today in Human Events I discuss some recent headaches for Nihad Awad, Honest Ibe Hooper, Brave Ahmed Rehab, and the whole merry CAIR gang:

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a longtime partner of the FBI in its efforts to reach out to American Muslims, now appears to be under criminal investigation by that same FBI. It's a refreshing breakthrough of sanity in the FBI's dealing with the domestic terror threat -- and it came to light just as CAIR was poised to win yet another victory in its ongoing campaign of harassment and intimidation against anyone who dares draw attention to jihadist activity in the United States.

CAIR, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, is an unindicted co-conspirator in a Hamas terror funding case -- so named by the Justice Department. CAIR operatives have repeatedly refused to denounce Hamas and Hizballah as terrorist groups. Several former CAIR officials have been convicted of various crimes related to jihad terror. CAIR's cofounder and longtime Board chairman (Omar Ahmad), as well as its chief spokesman (Ibrahim "Honest Ibe" Hooper), have made Islamic supremacist statements. Yet despite the many indications that CAIR was not exactly a paragon of patriotism and loyalty to Constitutional values, the FBI worked closely with CAIR for years - until the organization's unindicted co-conspirator status was too much even for the politically correct Feds, and the FBI ended work with CAIR in fall 2008.

Yet even then, there was no public indication that CAIR was under investigation. That came to light through a series of improbable events. A young man named Chris Gaubatz, posing as a new convert to Islam named David "Dawud" Marshall, secured an internship with CAIR in 2008 - and began to carry out of CAIR headquarters 12,000 pages of documents and even audiotapes of CAIR officials.

This material became the basis for the explosive book Muslim Mafia: Inside the Secret Underworld That's Conspiring to Islamize America, by Chris's father David Gaubatz and Paul Sperry, which contains numerous revelations about the group's shady internal dealings. Muslim Mafia confirms what veteran CAIR-watchers have long suspected: that CAIR is an integral part of the Muslim Brotherhood's apparatus in the U.S.

The Brotherhood is an international Islamic organization, the parent group of both Hamas and Al-Qaeda, that is in its own words dedicated in America to "a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying Western civilization from within and sabotaging its miserable house." Muslim Mafia contains details of how CAIR has tried to block anti-terror investigations -- and has meanwhile insinuated itself into the highest levels of power in Washington.

As a result of the revelations in Muslim Mafia, Representatives Sue Myrick (R-NC) Trent Franks (R-AZ) Paul Broun (R-GA) and John Shadegg (R-AZ) wrote a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder, requesting that he "provide each Member of Congress a summary of the evidence and findings by the DOJ and FBI which led them to name CAIR an unindicted co-conspirator in a terrorism trial." Holder has not publicly complied, but CAIR is by no means out of the woods yet.

When Muslim Mafia hit bookstore shelves, CAIR did not deny any of its allegations, resorting instead to its tried-and-true tactic of shooting the messenger, defaming the Gaubatzes and Sperry as "hatemongers" and suing to recover the documents, claiming that the material had been stolen and even that Chris Gaubatz had trespassed on CAIR property.

A court ruled in CAIR's favor, but just as CAIR was about to regain control of the documents, the FBI stepped in with a subpoena, taking the documents for its own hitherto unknown investigation of CAIR.

This investigation is long overdue. The respect and access CAIR has enjoyed from government and law enforcement agencies, as well as the mainstream media, has long been out of sync with its steadfast opposition to virtually every anti-terror measure that has been devised since 9/11; its assistance in an attempt to sue airline passengers who reported on suspicious activity by Muslims in an airport; and its relentless demonization of everyone who speaks honestly about the jihad threat in the U.S.

CAIR should be closed down, and its officers prosecuted where prosecution is justified. And if that ever happens, Americans will finally be able to be sure that the resistance to jihad activity in the U.S. is on track.