This viciously biased Times of Israel piece treats the Southern Poverty Law Center as if it were a respectable organization, which it isn’t by a long shot. The SPLC is a propaganda organ for the Left, tarring any group that dissents from its extreme political agenda as a “hate group.” It could be easily dismissed were it not for the fact that the establishment propaganda media constantly treats it as if it were a reliable source. But who watches the watchman? Although the SPLC lists hundreds of groups as “hate groups,” it includes not a single Leftist or Islamic jihad group among them. And its “hate group” designation against the Family Research Council led one of its followers to storm the FRC offices with a gun, determined to murder the chief of the FRC. This shows that these kinds of charges shouldn’t be thrown around frivolously, as tools to demonize and marginalize those whose politics the SPLC dislikes. But that is exactly what they do. Its hard-Left leanings are well known and well documented. This Weekly Standard article sums up much of what is wrong with the SPLC.
“Defending anti-Muslim group, Israel’s envoy to US slams racism watchdog,” by Gavin Rabinowitz, Times of Israel, December 14, 2016:
Israel’s ambassador to the US launched a scathing attack on the Southern Poverty Law Center in a speech Tuesday, calling the American civil rights organization “defamers and the blacklisters.”
Ron Dermer was speaking at an award ceremony held Tuesday by the Center for Security Policy, a think tank which openly espouses anti-Islamic views and conspiracy theories.
The SPLC had urged Dermer to reject the invitation to be guest of honor, along with president of the Zionist Organization of America Morton Klein, at the Center for Security Policy’s annual Freedom Flame award.
The civil rights organization described the Center for Security Policy as a promoter of conspiracy theories. “In recent years the CSP has gone from a hawkish think tank on foreign affairs to a promoter of baseless conspiracy theories and groundless accusations,” it wrote in its Field Guide to Anti-Muslim Extremists, which included CSP head Frank Gaffney.
But Dermer instead blasted the SPLC for even having the field guide, noting that it included people like Daniel Pipes, who he called “one of the great scholars of the Middle East,” and former Dutch parliamentarian Ayaan Hirsi Ali.
Somali-born Ali, a member of the Dutch Parliament from 2003 to 2006, has been quoted as making comments critical of Islam. Ali was raised in a strict Muslim family, but after surviving a civil war, genital mutilation, beatings and an arranged marriage, she renounced the faith in her 30s.
In 2014 Brandeis University rescinded a decision to award her an honorary degree, saying some of her previous comments were Islamophobic.
“Today, Ayaan Hirsi Ali is one of the world’s great champions of freedom, pluralism and tolerance. And every self-respecting group that claims to value any of those things should be defending her not defaming her,” Dermer said.
“Yet in an Orwellian inversion of reality, a woman whose life is threatened every day by extremist Muslims is labeled by the SPLC an anti-Muslim extremist,” The ambassador said. “Have those who put Ayaan on that list no shame? Have they no decency?”
“Well, ladies and Gentlemen, I don’t stand with the defamers and the blacklisters. I stand with Ayaan Hirsi Ali. We all should stand with Ayaan Hirsi Ali,” Dermer said….
During his speech Dermer also defended Gaffney, the founder and president of CSP.
Gaffney was a top Pentagon official during the Reagan administration. He has made it his mission, he says, to expose creeping Islamism in the American establishment. He also has ties to conservative pro-Israel groups and websites.
“I have known Frank Gaffney for many years. And while I don’t agree with every single thing he says and believes, Frank is no hater and no bigot,” Dermer said….