How clueless and compromised are this country’s moneyed Leftist elites? This clueless and compromised. As you can see in the screenshot above from Intersections International’s website, Reza Aslan is being “honored for his work at the intersection of religion, scholarship, and global peacemaking.” (Thanks to Pamela Hall.)
Reza Aslan is a Board member of the National Iranian American Council (NIAC), which has been established in court as a lobbying group for the Islamic Republic of Iran. Said Michael Rubin: “Jamal Abdi, NIAC’s policy director, now appears to push aside any pretense that NIAC is something other than Iran’s lobby. Speaking at the forthcoming ‘Expose AIPAC’ conference, Abdi is featured on the ‘Training: Constituent Lobbying for Iran’ panel. Oops.” According to Charles C. Johnson in the Daily Caller: “Iranian state-run media have referred to the National Iranian-American Council (NIAC) since at least 2006 as ‘Iran’s lobby’ in the U.S.” Iranian freedom activist Hassan Daioleslam “documented over a two-year period that NIAC is a front group lobbying on behalf of the Iranian regime.” NIAC had to pay him nearly $200,000 in legal fees after they sued him for defamation over his accusation that they were a front group for the mullahs, and lost. Yet Aslan remains on their Board.
Also, Aslan has tried to pass off Iran’s genocidally-minded former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as a liberal reformer and has called on the U.S. Government to negotiate with Ahmadinejad himself, as well as with the jihad terror group Hamas. Aslan has even praised the jihad terror group Hizballah as “the most dynamic political and social organization in Lebanon,” as well as the anti-Semitic, misogynist, Islamic supremacist Muslim Brotherhood, which is dedicated in its own words, according to a captured internal document, to “eliminating and destroying Western civilization from within.” Aslan wrote: “The Muslim Brotherhood will have a significant role to play in post-Mubarak Egypt. And that is good thing.” Tens of millions of Egyptians obviously disagree.
He has also applauded and called for fascist vandalism to deny the freedom of speech to those he hates. Yet this foul-mouthed terror apologist is laden with honors and awards as he smears Israel and defenders of freedom. Intersections International is no stranger to lauding fascists, however, having previously honored anti-free speech thug Mona Eltahawy. Intersections International says this of itself: “Since its establishment in 2008, Intersections International has worked toward a world where every person—regardless of race, culture, gender, ideology or sexual orientation—is treated with mutual respect and understanding.”
Here is how Reza Aslan accords mutual respect and understanding to people he hates: he accuses them of murder (the murder in question was actually an Islamic honor killing, not an “Islamophobic hate crime” at all):
More Aslan mutual respect and understanding here and here. So what makes Intersections International think this reckless, immature, foul-mouthed creep with ties to the bloody leadership of the Islamic Republic of Iran and friendly relationships with groups linked to the Muslim Brotherhood is a good honoree for “global peacemaking”? Because he has the right political opinions, of course, of standard far-Left issue.
Contact Intersections International and let them know, politely and calmly, what you think of them honoring a Board member of a lobbying group for the Islamic Republic of Iran as a “global peacemaker.”
Intersections International
145 W 28th St., 11th Floor
New York, NY 10001 USA
T: 212.951.7006
F: 212.951.7212
communications@intersections.org