“Muslim advocacy groups forced the FBI to purge some 876 documents from its training materials because they were deemed ‘offensive’ in March 2012, Cruz explained.” This actually goes back farther than that. On October 19, 2011, Farhana Khera of Muslim Advocates delivered a letter to John Brennan, who was then the assistant to the president on National Security for Homeland Security and Counter Terrorism.
The letter was signed by the leaders of virtually all significant Islamic groups in the United States: 57 Muslim, Arab, and South Asian organizations, many with ties to Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood, including the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), the Muslim American Society (MAS), the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA), Islamic Relief USA, and the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC).
The letter denounced what it characterized as U.S. government agencies’ “use of biased, false and highly offensive training materials about Muslims and Islam.” It emphasized that this was an issue of the utmost importance:
The seriousness of this issue cannot be overstated, and we request that the White House immediately create an interagency task force to address this problem, with a fair and transparent mechanism for input from the Muslim, Arab, and South Asian communities, including civil rights lawyers, religious leaders, and law enforcement experts.
The task force was needed because:
[W]hile recent news reports have highlighted the FBI’s use of biased experts and training materials, we have learned that this problem extends far beyond the FBI and has infected other government agencies, including the U.S. Attorney’s Anti-Terrorism Advisory Councils, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, and the U.S. Army. Furthermore, by the FBI’s own admission, the use of bigoted and distorted materials in its trainings has not been an isolated occurrence. Since last year, reports have surfaced that the FBI, and other federal agencies, are using or supporting the use of biased trainers and materials in presentations to law enforcement officials.
Khera also complained about my work: that my books could be found in “the FBI’s library at the FBI training academy in Quantico, Virginia”; that a reading list accompanying a slide presentation by the FBI’s Law Enforcement Communications Unit recommended my book The Truth About Muhammad; that in July 2010 I “presented a two-hour seminar on ‘the belief system of Islamic jihadists’ to the Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) in Tidewater, Virginia”; and that I also “presented a similar lecture to the U.S. Attorney’s Anti-Terrorism Advisory Council, which is co-hosted by the FBI’s Norfolk Field Office.”
These were supposed to be terrible materials because I was supposedly bigoted and hateful. However, many of the examples Khera adduced of “bigoted and distorted materials” involved statements that were simply accurate. The only distortion was Khera’s representation of them.
For instance, Khera stated:
A 2006 FBI intelligence report stating that individuals who convert to Islam are on the path to becoming “Homegrown Islamic Extremists,” if they exhibit any of the following behavior:
“Wearing traditional Muslim attire”
“Growing facial hair”
“Frequent attendance at a mosque or a prayer group”
“Travel to a Muslim country”
“Increased activity in a pro-Muslim social group or political cause”
Well, the FBI intelligence report Khera purported to be describing didn’t actually say that. Rather, it included these behaviors among a list of fourteen indicators that could “identify an individual going through the radicalization process.” Other indicators included:
“Travel without obvious source of funds”
“Suspicious purchases of bomb making paraphernalia or weapons”
“Large transfer of funds, from or to overseas”
“Formation of operational cells”
Khera had selectively quoted the list to give the impression that the FBI was teaching that devout observance of Islam led inevitably and in every case to “extremism.”
Despite the factual accuracy of the material about which they were complaining, the Muslim groups signing the letter demanded that the task force, among other actions:
“Purge all federal government training materials of biased materials.”
“Implement a mandatory re-training program for FBI agents, U.S. Army officers, and all federal, state and local law enforcement who have been subjected to biased training.”
They wished to ensure that all law enforcement officials ever learn about Islam and jihad would be what the signatories wanted them to learn — and Brennan was amenable to that. He took Khera’s complaints as his marching orders.
In a November 3, 2011, letter to Khera that — significantly — was written on White House stationery, Brennan made no attempt to defend counter-terror materials and procedures. He instead accepted Khera’s criticisms without a murmur of protest and assured her of his readiness to comply:
Please allow me to share with you the specific steps we are taking to ensure that federal officials and state, local and tribal partners receive accurate, evidence-based information in these crucial areas.
Brennan assured Khera that all her demands would be met:
Your letter requests that “the White House immediately create an interagency task force to address this problem,” and we agree that this is necessary.
He then detailed other specific actions being undertaken, including “collecting all training materials that contain cultural or religious content, including information related to Islam or Muslims.” In reality, this material wouldn’t just be “collected”; it would be purged of anything that Farhana Khera and others like her found offensive. Honest, accurate discussion of how Islamic jihadists use Islamic teachings to justify violence would no longer be allowed.
The alacrity with which Brennan complied was unfortunate on many levels. Numerous books and presentations that gave a perfectly accurate view of Islam and jihad were purged. Brennan was complying with demands from quarters that could hardly be considered authentically moderate.
Four-and-a-half years later, this entrenched policy of the U.S. government ensured that people such as Omar Mateen simply cannot be identified as risks. The administration is bound, as a matter of policy, to ignore what in saner times would be taken as warning signs. And Attorney General Loretta Lynch speaks at Muslim Advocates events. That explains a great deal.
“Obama Admin Refuses to Inform Congress of ‘Islamic Terrorism’ in U.S.,” by Adam Kredo, Daily Caller, June 28, 2016:
Senior Obama administration officials refused to appear before Congress on Tuesday to explain the recent decision to purge all references to “Islamic terrorism” and radicalism from public documents, according to disclosures made Tuesday on Capitol Hill.
Top officials from the Justice Department and FBI declined to appear on Capitol Hill to answer questions from lawmakers about domestic terror attacks and an administration policy of scrubbing references to Islamic terrorism and similar terms from government materials, lawmakers said.
The policy has thwarted attempts by federal authorities to stop an increasing series of terror attacks from taking place on United States soil, according to Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Texas), chair of the Senate Judiciary subcommittee on oversight.
In the past year the Obama administration has twice ordered that mentions of the terror group ISIS and “Islamic terrorism” be purged “from highly significant public records,” Cruz said.
One such effort took place in the aftermath of the recent terrorist shooting in Orlando in which the administration censored 911 transcripts of calls made by the shooter.
These efforts came amid other campaigns by the Department of Homeland Security to force its personnel to remove references to “jihad,” “sharia,” and other similar terms from material focused on methods to counter violent extremism, Cruz said.
“I would like nothing more than to speak with a government official about these bizarre decisions and omissions, especially in light of the most recent terrorist attack in Orlando by a radicalized man who had been interviewed three times by the FBI,” Cruz said.
“Indeed, this subcommittee invited two such witnesses: John P. Carlin, an assistant attorney general for the Department of Justice’s National Security Division, and Michael B. Steinbach, the executive assistant director for the FBI’s National Security Branch,” he said. “Both have refused to appear.”
Cruz blamed the administration’s policy for contributing to recent terror attacks in Orlando, San Bernardino, and Boston.
There has been a “consistent effort by this administration to scrub any reference to radical Islamic terrorism, to pretend the threat does not exist, and tragically as a consequence of that, over and over again, we have instances where the administration has ample evidence of radical Islamic terrorists,” Cruz said.
“The consequence of a willful blindness, of a policy that is a matter of administration policy, refusal to acknowledge the threat, means over and over again this administration has allowed the threats to go forward,” he added.
The administration “had declined to appear and explain” this policy and rationale behind it despite multiple requests from Congress.
“Are government officials prohibited from debating anything about Islam?” Cruz asked. “We would like to hear an explanation for that.”
The efforts to avoid using these terms have been longstanding in the Obama administration.
Muslim advocacy groups forced the FBI to purge some 876 documents from its training materials because they were deemed “offensive” in March 2012, Cruz explained.
“One article was purged because it was ‘highly inflammatory’ and ‘inaccurately argues the Muslim Brotherhood is a terrorist organization,’” he added….