Shock: Government ‘De-radicalization’ Expert on Terror Watch List
Following the attempted bombing of Northwest Flight 253 on Christmas Day, the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) has come under fire for failing to connect the dots concerning bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab. But new information concerning the NCTC’s de-radicalization expert, Yasir Qadhi, raises questions about how far the rot of political correctness extends within the agency most responsible for connecting the dots.
Qadhi’s association with the NCTC came to light late last week in a report by CNN that Abdulmutallab had attended a 16-day conference in Houston sponsored by the AlMaghrib Institute, where Qadhi is a featured instructor. The report also noted that Abdulmutallab had attended two other AlMaghrib events in the UK.
Qadhi spoke to CNN on behalf of AlMaghrib, attempting to explain away the terrorist’s repeated attendance at his organization’s events. Towards the end of the CNN report came a disturbing revelation:
Qadhi, of New Haven, Connecticut, has been involved in de-radicalization efforts in the United States and was a leading participant in the U.S. Counter-Radicalization Strategy conference organized by the National Counterterrorism Center in the summer of 2008.
To say that Yasir Qadhi has been involved in de-radicalization efforts in the U.S. is a sick joke. That he was a leading participant in the NCTC’s conference on counter-radicalization is a step into the surreal. Was al-Qaeda cleric Anwar Al-Aulaqi not available to attend? When it comes to Islamic radicalization, Yasir Qadhi is the problem, not the solution. And the NCTC only had to consult its own records to know exactly who they were dealing with.
An August 8, 2006, article in the Houston Chronicle reported on a meeting in Houston with Department of Homeland Security officials where Yasir Qadhi complained openly that he was on the terror watch list.
How might have the NCTC’s de-radicalization expert ended up on the terror watch list? Was his placement on the terror watch list some kind of mistake and an example of rampant Islamophobia? Hardly. Just last week, in response to the CNN report, a post at the Jawa Report observed that Qadhi’s Ilmquest media company had been selling more than a dozen audio CD sets by al-Qaeda cleric Aulaqi, even after the cleric had been tied to the Ft. Hood shootings (the post included a screen shot of Ilmquest’s Aulaqi products — all since removed from the Ilmquest website). Aulaqi’s sermons have also recently been sold at AlMaghrib seminars. These sales of Aulaqi’s sermons continued while Qadhi criticized Aulaqi on his MuslimMatters website.
Additionally, Qadhi has been one of the most outspoken advocates for convicted “Virginia jihad network leader” Abu Al-Tamimi, and his MuslimMatters website openly champions the cause of captured al-Qaeda operative Aafia Siddiqui.
Last July I wrote here at PJ Media about an upcoming appearance by Qadhi at an AlMaghrib seminar in my hometown of Columbus, Ohio, noting the virulently anti-Jewish statements by Qadhi. In a sermon delivered by Qadhi in 2001, where he directed his listeners to a book entitled The Hoax of the Holocaust, he elaborated on that book’s theme of how Adolf Hitler was misunderstood:
All of these Polish Jews which Hitler was supposedly trying to exterminate, that’s another point, by the way, Hitler never intended to mass-destroy the Jews. There are a number of books out on this written by Christians, you should read them. The Hoax of the Holocaust, I advise you to read this book and write this down, The Hoax of the Holocaust, a very good book. All of this is false propaganda and I know it sounds so far-fetched, but read it. The evidences [sic] are very strong. And they’re talking about newspaper articles, clippings, everything and look up yourself what Hitler really wanted to do. We’re not defending Hitler, by the way, but the Jews, the way that they portray him, also is not correct.
Bug? … or feature?
You really should consider renaming this site, Character Assasination Dot Com, because though quite inept at unearthing anything useful, the writers here excel at distorting and misreprenting. Did you know about this:
“The comments were made in the context of the creation of the modern state of Israel. I claimed that Jews used the guilt of the Holocaust to extract from the UN the promise of a Jewish state, even though the Arabs from whom land was being taken had not been complicit in the crimes of the Nazis… In the summer of 1999, someone had forwarded me a website of a group that called itself the ‘Institute for Historical Review’. At the time, I found the articles on it quite fascinating; the pseudo-scientific style in which they wrote gave the impression that they were a serious academic research body. It was only later, after more research, that I realized that they were a front for a group of actual anti-Semites, and were the leading Holocaust-denial organization in the world… But even in that talk, I did not deny the actual occurrence of the Holocaust, or express any support or admiration for Hitler, or claim that all Jews were worthy of being despised or hated… Just to clarify: I firmly believe that the Holocaust was one of the worst crimes against humanity that the 20th century has witnessed. Such a crime did not happen overnight, either. Rather, the systematic dehumanization of the Jews in the public eye of the Germans was a necessary precursor to this event.”
Had you bothered to read the article, you would have seen that I not only noted this, but linked to Qadhi’s explanation:
Excellent column, thank you.
The fifth column is growing more powerful every day.
1. JFM:
Bug? … or feature?
I will go with feature. I have always been of the opinion that the clowns presently in the white house are sympathetic to islam. if not actively working with it at least as enablers.
Congress, to the rescue? So, the “beautiful people,” the middle class Bill Ayers and Jane Fonda and their fellow travelers in congress, after a sojourn renouncing traditional middle class values during the Vietnam War, have now discovered the discrete charm of middle class family values? It is curious how the urban middle don’t do wars anymore: “Hell no, we won’t go!” Now that being bourgeois is popular again, it’s amusing watching the baby boomer elite bungle as usual. It’s hard being a role model to lower class gang banging dregs when the upper classes practice the same perfidy and bad behaviors on a higher cultural level; but, then again, in the age of cultural and linguistic relativity, it’s difficult to connect dots when you don’t even know what “bad” is and can only profile people to dole out the goodies.
Islamic , radical, symphathizers, enablers = present administration
..and maybe the one before it to some extent.
American public in general = blind as a bat.
Could it get any more bizarre? Only if we find out that Qadhi is Obama’s cousin.
What do we do with media outlets that think that this is OK? There was a time when someone being this stupid would have to flee the country They are dieing but Government money keeps getting diverted to keep them alive
It makes perfect sense…hire a terrorist because you want to understand them enough to deradicalize them…yeah right. Yet another instance of idiots in government service who would have you believe they know what they are doing. They work for the goverment because they are unfit to do anything useful…like produce something that society can actually use. So, they suck off of Uncle Sugar’s hind tit.
Wow, news flash! Muslim terrorist expert actualyy muslim terrorist! Who, who’d have thought! D’oh!
10: that’s why he is the expert. A science expert is a scientist, a terrorist expert is a terrorist. On the other hand a climate expert can be Al Gore. Go figure.
You have to wonder – do we not have anyone in our counter terrorism community that is familiar with the Muslim concept of taqiyya? Taqiyya is an Arabic word roughly translated meaning snow-job when talking to infidels about Islam.
There is an awesome book out there that was recently released that details the spiderweb of terror connections thru and around all of these groups and individuals with CAIR at the center of it and how we are doomed unless we realize that the enemy is not merely at the gates but it has made itself the gatekeeper of our very lives in preparation for its ultimate goal of destroying our society and replacing it with an unending tyranny that makes even the abomination of Nazism look tame.
The book is called THE MUSLIM MAFIA by P. David Gaubatz and Paul Sperry.
http://www.muslimmafia.com/about/about-the-book/
Good God, I thought I had clicked on to the Onion. I did, I’m serious.
Couldn’t disagree more, with Carol B. that is. The general public gets more & more up to speed on what ISLAM really is every day. It is the “in the tank” politically correct media that refuses to acknowledge the truth. This is a religious war, whether we like it or not, because our enemies have deemed it so. Let’s fight it like one. An imam is a far easier target than a muhajadeen. We know where he stands every Friday.
i once hired a fox to guard my chicken coop at night, sure enough i never had to worry about my chickens ever again. to quote Forest Gump stupid is as stupid does.
john from cinncinatti:
The government gave you a free (“paid for by tax dollars”) fox to guard your chicken coop. I guess that is a lot like hiring one!
“I claimed that Jews used the guilt of the Holocaust to extract from the UN the promise of a Jewish state, even though the Arabs from whom land was being taken had not been complicit in the crimes of the Nazis.”
Firstly, no land was ‘taken’ from the Arabs, it was won/captured in a war of self-defence.
Secondly, the “Palestinian” leadership was *directly* complicit in the crimes of the Nazis:
–
“The [Palestinian] Mufti was one of the initiators of the systematic extermination of European Jewry and had been a collaborator and adviser of Eichmann and Himmler in the execution of this plan. … He was one of Eichmann’s best friends and had constantly incited him to accelerate the extermination measures. I heard him say, accompanied by Eichmann, he had visited incognito the gas chamber of Auschwitz.” – Dieter Wisliceny, Eichmann’s Assistant
–
Also see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Himmler_to_Mufti_telegram_1943.png
Firstly, no land was ‘taken’ from the Arabs, it was won/captured in a war of self-defence.
Or bought and paid before Israel’s independence.
Is he OUR deradicalization expert or THEIRS?
I’ll vote for the obvious, theirs.
{^_^}