CAIR’s Ibrahim Hooper, still unable to find anything in my own writings that he can use to attack me, focuses again on unmoderated comments at this site. “Muslims see a growing media bias” by Jim Ritter in the Chicago Sun-Times, with thanks to all who sent this in:
Web sites are especially virulent, Hooper said. Consider these comments recently posted on the blog of Robert Spencer, director of Jihad Watch and author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades).
“¢ “If I happen to wax hateful and angry from time to time when it comes to the subject of Islam, that is the fault of Islam and its thriving terrorist establishment. . . . It is good to hate your enemies: We are going to have to kill them.”
“¢ “Islam is not only a cult, it’s a political movement. As such it contravenes the constitution and espouses treason.”
“¢ “I hate is-lame with an incandescent intensity.”
(Spencer says he does not hate Muslims. Postings from others “are unmoderated and do not necessarily reflect the views of Jihad Watch or Robert Spencer.”)
Hooper said he wishes he could dismiss such sentiments as fringe opinions. “But that’s not the case.”
It was good of Jim Ritter to include that parenthetical note above. It would have been better if he had bothered to contact me for some response to this before allowing Hooper to defame me and Jihad Watch in his newspaper, but I’m not really surprised by this.
Comments at Jihad Watch are unmoderated. Of course, we have asked posters many times to watch what they say so as to avoid giving ammunition to our opponents, and this Sun-Times article shows why that is important. But this is nevertheless an open forum. Many Islamic apologists, and even terror apologists, have posted here, and neither their views nor those of the people Hooper quoted are the positions of Jihad Watch. It is noteworthy that Hooper did not quote comments like these, which have also appeared recently in Jihad Watch’s open forum:
Other posters at Jihad Watch have openly endorsed violent jihad. Here’s a recent one from a poster calling himself “Abdullah Karim”:
What of the posts Hooper does quote? He would do well to examine them closely before dismissing them as “Islamophobia.” The first post he quotes says that if he is “angry from time to time when it comes to the subject of Islam, that is the fault of Islam and its thriving terrorist establishment….It is good to hate your enemies: We are going to have to kill them.”
What about this offends Hooper? Ibrahim, you are welcome to comment here and explain, or to email me at director@jihadwatch.org, but in the meantime I will speculate a bit. I suspect that what offends you about this is the idea that any anger anyone has toward Islam or Muslims could be the “fault of Islam.” But consider it from the infidel point of view for just a moment. Here you are in the Chicago Sun Times wringing your hands about “Islamophobia” and posing as a victim, when in fact several members of your organization have been arrested and convicted of various terrorism-related activities, and you no longer contest Anti-CAIR’s characterization of CAIR as a “terrorist supporting front organization” that “wishes nothing more than the implementation of Sharia law in America” and is a group that was “founded by Hamas supporters which seeks to overthrow Constitutional government in the United States and replace it with an Islamist theocracy using our own Constitution as protection.”
Can you see the cognitive dissonance there? I suspect you can. And don’t think infidels haven’t noticed it also. I believe that you, Mr. Hooper, are one of those who are responsible for the anger some non-Muslims feel toward Muslims today: these non-Muslims are not fools. They can see through posturing and disingenuousness. They see all the things that don’t tally with your professed anti-terrorism, and see that you have never answered lingering questions about where your organization really stands. They can see how you trump up anti-Muslim hate crimes. But of course, I doubt any of this will cause you concern: after all, you are entirely willing to use that anger for your own purposes in the Chicago Sun Times, with Jim Ritter as your willing dupe.
As for the other posts you quoted, do you deny that Islam is a political movement? After all, did you yourself not say: “I wouldn’t want to create the impression that I wouldn’t like the government of the United States to be Islamic sometime in the future. But I’m not going to do anything violent to promote that. I’m going to do it through education.” If you attain this goal, would this not entail altering the Constitution to bring it in line with Sharia on questions such as women’s rights, the rights of non-Muslims, and other matters? As such, was the poster wrong to say that such an aspiration “contravenes the constitution and espouses treason”? If you deny this, are you prepared to renounce publicly the aspects of Sharia that do indeed contravene the Constitution?
As for the third comment, you could do a great deal to mitigate this hate by coming clean about CAIR, as explained above, and actively working to resist jihad terror, instead of working to obstruct anti-terror efforts.
Finally, a word about CAIR’s focus. Jihad Watch reader Jimmy the Claw recently sent me a highly revealing Excel spreadsheet, listing many of the violent jihad attacks since 9/11, with CAIR’s press releases since that time interspersed. It reveals CAIR’s focus on “Islamophobic” minutiae, and relative silence about global jihad violence. Here it is:
Islamic attacks vs. CAIR press releases
Here’s a small sampling:
6/29/06: Iraq, Kirkuk: 2 Killed. A 15-year-old girl is among two people kidnapped and murdered by radical Muslims.
6/29/06: Iraq, Baghdad: 8 Killed, 4 Injured. In separate attacks, Jihadis kill eight civilians including a baker, and electrical worker, a garbage collector and a university professor.
6/29/06: Iraq, Hilla: 14 Killed. Fourteen bodies are found in Hilla, Kut and Karbala. The victims included women and children who were killed in brutal fashion.
6/29/06: Iraq, Kirkuk: 4 Killed, 27 Injured. A suicide bomber kills four Iraqis at a funeral.
6/29/06: India, Kashmir: 2 Killed. Two civilians are shot to death by radical Muslims in separate attacks (Kangan and Bandipore).
6/29/06: Algeria, Albalouta: 2 Killed, 11 Injured. Islamic fundamentalists attack a communal guard post with rockets, killing two people, whose bodies they later burned.
6/29/06: CAIR-CAN Seeks Freedom for Rights Activist Held in China
6/29/06: CAIR-OH: Muslims Meet with Political Candidates
6/29/06: CAIR: U.S. Muslims Condemn Kidnapping of Palestinian Officials
6/29/06: CAIR Calls Ruling Against Gitmo Trials ‘Victory for Rule of Law’
6/30/06: Pakistan, Spinkai Raghzai: 1 Killed, 3 Injured. Local Taliban shoot a rival religious leader to death.
6/30/06: Iraq, Baghdad: 7 Killed. Six bodies are found dumped in a house and Jihadi terrorists elsewhere gun down an Imam.
6/30/06: Pakistan, Ipi: 1 Killed. Shouting “Allah akbar,” executioners shoot a man to death in a public square.
7/1/06: Thailand, Yala: 1 Killed. Muslim terrorists shoot a civilian off of his motorcycle.
7/1/06: Iraq, Baghdad: 62 Killed, 114 Injured. Sixty-two Shiite shoppers are blown to bits in a horrific marketplace bombing by Sunni terrorists that leaves over a hundred others in various stages of suffering.
7/1/06: Iraq, Mosul: 2 Killed, 6 Injured. Two people are killed by a suicide bomber.
7/1/06: Afghanistan, Sangin: 3 Killed, 4 Injured. Two Brits and an Afghan interpretered are killed in an attack on their compound by the Taliban.
7/1/06: Iraq, Haditha: 5 Killed, 12 Injured. Jihadis mortar a residential neighborhood, killing five residents.
7/1/06: Thailand, Narathiwat: 1 Killed. Radical Muslims shoot a 22-year-old man to death as he is sleeping in the back of his pick-up truck.
7/1/06: CAIR-Chicago Meets with Delegation of Danish Youth
Get the picture?
I am not saying CAIR should issue condemnations of every one of these jihad attacks. If they did, they would have time to do nothing else (which may not be a bad thing, of course). But what is Ibrahim Hooper doing in the face of worldwide, daily jihad violence? He is complaining about some comments on a website. With a free pass from Jim Ritter, who apparently never thought to ask him about what he was doing to stop the jihad violence that gives rise to anger among posters here. Maybe Jim Ritter is looking to get a lucrative job with Reuters.