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Christie Administration in NJ Concludes NYPD Surveillance Was Legal

May 27th, 2012 - 8:41 am

It is especially unfortunate, moreover, that NYPD’s detractors (AP and Muslim activists in particular) continue to emphasize the fact that the surveillance activities focused on “students.” If journalists did their homework (or were not so Islamophilic), this would be a strong point in the NYPD’s favor.

As I detail in The Grand Jihad, the Muslim Students Association — which now has hundreds of chapters in North America — is the the first building block in the Muslim Brotherhood’s American infrastructure. It has a rigorous program in which students study the writings of such Islamic supremacist icons as Hassan al-Banna, Sayyid Qutb and Abul Ala al-Mawdudi, and participate in various forms of proselytism (dawa or what Robert Spencer aptly calls “stealth jihad”).  There is extensive empirical evidence that many students who go through this Brotherhood-prescribed indoctrination end up sympathizing with, facilitating, or even participating in violent jihadism — to say nothing of promoting the sharia agenda that imperils American civil liberties. (See, e.g., this report from Steve Emerson’s Investigative Project on Terrorism.) If anybody in the Muslim community ought to be drawing the attention of the authorities and the public at large, it is the Muslims Student Association — which, by the way, evolved over the years into the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), the most important Islamist group in the United States, and one that was designated an unindicted coconspirator by the Justice Department in the Holy Land Foundation Hamas financing case because it was shown to have abetted the transfer of funds from the U.S. to Palestinian jihadists.

It is, of course, easy for me to cite these facts aloud. I am not seeking or holding public office in New Jersey, so it is of no moment to me, as it obviously is to the Christie administration, that New Jersey has a large, politically active Muslim population. Nonetheless, my unsolicited advice (which I’m sure the governor is just dying to hear) is that good policy makes good politics: It is better to convey the strong message to the Muslim community that it is obliged to help us discredit sharia supremacism than to convey the strong message that we are obliged to walk on eggshells around the Muslim community. Stop worrying about Islamist organizations like CAIR, ISNA and MPAC — they don’t speak for most rank-and-file American Muslims, so don’t confuse their popularity in the left-leaning media with popularity generally.

The self-ordained “leaders” of the Muslim community went predictably berserk over Attorney General Chiesa’s conclusions. It is unfortunate that he felt the need to announce the establishment of a “Muslim community outreach committee” to appease this insatiable grievance enterprise. But that said, kudos to the Christie administration for doing the right thing and acknowledging the legality and propriety of the NYPD surveillance. Thanks, also, to Gov. Christie for not sticking his thumb on the scale against the NYPD despite the public bickering between him and New York officials — many lesser public officials would not have been as scrupulous.

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