The FBI’s Muslim Outreach Follies
When FBI Director Robert Mueller testifies today for a House Judiciary Committee oversight hearing, undoubtedly he will be questioned about the FBI’s ongoing “Islamophobia” purge.
Specifically, members of Congress are concerned about the FBI’s continued secrecy regarding the identity of the three outside subject matter experts (SME) the bureau brought in to help with the purge (two other SMEs from inside the FBI assisted). One reason for congressional skepticism about the FBI’s use of these outside SMEs is that the bureau has an extensive history of failure when vetting Muslim outreach partners.
In June 2002, Director Mueller took fire for a speech to the American Muslim Council (AMC), which his spokesman described as “the most mainstream Muslim group in the United States.” During his speech Mueller asked the group for their help in fighting terrorism. But the head of AMC at the time was Abdurahman Alamoudi, who was videotaped in October 2000 delivering a speech just yards away from the White House, proclaiming: “I have been labeled by the media in New York as being a supporter of Hamas. We are all supporters of Hamas. I wish they added that I am also a supporter of Hezbollah.”
That same year, AMC board advisor and former acting President Jamil Al-Amin was arrested for murdering a Georgia police officer. Alamoudi was arrested in 2003 in a Libyan assassination plot targeting the Saudi crown prince, and was later identified by the U.S. Treasury as one of al-Qaeda’s top fundraisers in the United States.
At the time of Mueller’s speech in 2002, Alamoudi had been under investigation by the FBI for almost a decade for funneling money between Osama bin Laden and “Blind Sheikh” Omar Abdel Rahman. During the AMC conference at which Mueller spoke, Alamoudi approached Jewish Forward D.C. bureau chief Eli Kintisch are warned him that it might not be “good for your health” to remain at the event (ironically, during a panel discussion on “American Muslims and the Media”), prompting the reporter to leave.
In October 2003, just days before a ceremony honoring Detroit Muslim leader Imad Hamad and bestowing on him the Director’s Award for exceptional public service, the FBI contacted Hamad to tell him he wasn’t receiving the award. The FBI initially claimed they had decided to give the award to a victim of the 9/11 terror attacks, but later an FBI spokesman revealed that unflattering information about Hamad had been made public during the deportation proceedings for one of his close associates.
In fact, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) fought for two decades to deport Hamad for his suspected support for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a designated terrorist organization. That information had come to light not due to any checking or vetting by the FBI, but thanks to an article published by the New York Post days before Hamad was stripped of the award. In recent days, Hamad has been quoted encouraging the FBI’s ongoing “Islamophobia” purge.
During the trial of Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Sami Al-Arian, the terror leader’s attorney attempted to subpoena evidence of meetings and conversations that Al-Arian had with high-ranking officials at the Department of Justice, the Department of Homeland Security, the speaker of the House of Representatives, and even the White House. Al-Arian had gained access to the highest levels of the U.S. government despite having been subject to FISA wiretap warrants since the early 1990s and having his home raided in 1995. As part of a plea deal, Al-Arian admitted to being part of the leadership structure of the terrorist group and knowingly supporting the terrorist organization.
In 2008, Mueller handed one of his Director’s Community Leadership Awards to Imam Yahya Hendi, who had testified during Al-Arian’s trial as a defense witness. According to testimony delivered to the 9/11 Commission, Hendi had served as a moderator during a 2000 fundraiser for the Benevolence International Foundation, which was shut down in November 2002 by the U.S. government and designated a terrorist organization for its support of al-Qaeda and several other Islamic terrorist groups.
The FBI has a long history of partnering with groups accused of supporting Islamic terrorism. Among the first groups appointed to the FBI’s Arab, Muslim, and Sikh Advisory Council following the 9/11 attacks was the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). After CAIR was named an unindicted co-conspirator in the largest terrorism financing trial in American history, an FBI agent testified during that trial that CAIR was a front for the terrorist group Hamas. Federal prosecutors also told a federal court: “From its founding by Muslim Brotherhood leaders, CAIR conspired with other affiliates of the Muslim Brotherhood to support terrorists.” The FBI was publicly forced to sever ties with CAIR.
As I reported exclusively here at PJ Media last year, top FBI officials have continued to meet unofficially with CAIR, even to the point of working to conceal their ongoing relationship. This is despite CAIR warning its members last year to avoid speaking with the FBI.
Another story I broke in September 2010 detailed the inclusion of known Hamas cleric Kifah Mustapha. As part of a six-week FBI Citizens’ Academy, he was treated to guided tours of the top-secret National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC), FBI Headquarters, and the FBI Academy at Quantico. Mustapha’s participation in the FBI program came after he was personally named an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation trial and his appointment as a Muslim chaplain to the Illinois State Police had been revoked (a background check revealed his terrorist ties and support).
After the publication of my report, the FBI doubled-down on its support of Mustapha, dismissing his extensive Hamas connections and calling him an important Chicago-area Muslim leader. But when Mueller was asked about it following a speech he gave a week later, he refused to answer questions about Mustapha’s participation in the program. Court documents filed by the Chicago U.S. Attorney’s Office in response to Mustapha’s discrimination lawsuit against the Illinois State Police revealed that the special agent in charge of the Chicago FBI field office — the same office that had sponsored the Hamas cleric in the FBI Citizens’ Academy — had warned the state police that Mustapha would never be able to pass a background check for a similar position with the FBI. Yet the FBI’s own website states that a background check and interim security clearance are necessary for participation in the FBI Citizens’ Academy.
Several years ago the FBI started an affirmative action program to hire Moslem special agents. I guess this was necessary cuz they couldn’t possibly justify hiring all those highly paid Islamic feds for their loyalty, given what happened in the Sami al-Arian case, when a Moslem special agent failed to wear a wire to a dinner with Sami, later claiming that listening devices violated Islamic teachings. But, don’t worry, the insubordinate special agent wasn’t fired, he was instead given a big promotion, that to head the FBI’s Saudi desk. As for the affirmative action program, that employment discrimination is just cuz of all the Arabs whose ancestors who spent hundreds of years slaving away picking cotton on southern plantations.
Allah has already sanctioned for you the dissolution of your vows.
- Holy Prophet Allah in the Holy Ko-Ran 66:2
I use to think television’s version of government law inforcement agency’s incompetence was an exaggeration. I no longer think so.
Another “slide down the slippery slope” of accommodationist claptrap of the current (and previous) administration regarding the current Islamist threat. The FBI tactics to assuage disgruntled and vocal Muslims regarding “Islamophobia” is reflective of the Intelligence Community at large; intellectually suspect at best, intellectually dishonest at worst. Through various strategies and tactics since 2001 (and before such as during “ finger in the wind Bill Clintonian times”), various excuses, apologies, and trends attempted to explain the failure of the majority of the American Muslim population to stand up and state their beliefs regarding past and future events including 9/11. The “spokesmen” for the “Silent American Muslim majority” appear to be heavily Saudi funded, pro-Hamas and Hezbollah, Salafi Wahabbist terrorist sympathizers or enablers. In a previous career I would be censored for what I just wrote, but the winks and nods throughout the government whenever the question about Saudi involvement in events or which particular Islamic school might adhere to certain beliefs and practices was evident, at least amongst a minority of bureaucrats. The FBI approach is multi-dimensional, but effused by the apologetic emotion of not wanting to “disrespect” practitioners of the religion of “peace”. The failure to be intellectually honest and precise in discussing, researching, and identifying Islamist threats due to fears of being discriminatory fruition into the examples provided in this informative article of letting the “foxes” into the henhouse with veto authority and litmus test policies as to politically correct “Islamophic-free” approaches. The US military is also a victim of this as seen in the recent “freeze” on training due to controversial power point presentations! This weakness also diminished any proactive response which may have prevented the Ft. Hood massacre as well. The current “Taliban catch and release” program simultaneous to US service members fighting and dying is part of this failed approach. I wonder when someone will stop the sliding!
The problem is that until the FBI is allowed to declare that Islam is the enemy, then they will be continuously stepping in Islamic doo doo trying to ally with the agents of Islam. Think of Muslims as double agents that you have possibly cajoled into giving up the goods on their buddies, but still be very wary that they may still be working for the other team (and will certainly have supressed loyalties to it.
And then, of course, the fact the FBI never could figure out who “Deep Throat” of Watergate fame was is just the icing on the cup cake (since the snitch turned out to be the Associate FBI director, perhaps some slack should be cut here?). And “D.B. Cooper,” the first airline hijacker for ransom, is still a John Doe and unsolved case. The FBI do not always get their man or woman, or whatever.
To repeat a comment I made to an earlier Patrick Poole posting: FBI stands for Fumbling, Bumbling, Incompetents. The agency needs a makeover: Remove the counter-intelligence component and make it a separate agency, and then create another agency to fight petty theft which the FBI is very good at (although not so good at grand larceny).
The problem with the FBI is that it is a bureaucracy in the bad sense. By that I mean it has been around so long that the bureaucratic mindset has taken deep root. While there are no doubt some good agents in there, the higher ranks are filled with those are are best at infighting and gaming the system to get promoted. Studies show that narcissists tend to do well in bureaucracies, the stuffier it is and the more complex the rules the better.
This looks like a prime example of that. You’ve got agents bucking for promotion if not within the agency then their political career outside of it and so they pull something as PC (and stupid) as this. They are aiming to please whoever is going to give them a leg up on that promotion. Any ill effects their actions have on the agency or national security are irrelevant compared to moving up the ladder.
The problem is political correctness, and the lie it is based upon.
Simple critical truths are forbidden, and thus all manner of well meaning back-bending occurs in the “hope” that the truth can be modified, and some new reality forged from lies and wishful thinking.
Remove them, and you will find simplicity. Mohammad was evil, vile, and criminal by any interpretation. That he gained strength, and conquered many, is his only success. Blood and torture replacing any worthy Ideas of Worldy Value. He has no redeeming human character, other than to demonstrate what the human condition will sink to when the lowest and darkest desires rule.
After 13 centuries, there are but two types of personages that self identify as “Muslims”:
A- People of middle-eastern backgrounds who share regional/cultural similarities of dress, food and holidays, but are for the most part “Christian” in their attitudes of peaceful co-existence with others. They are seldom involved in the upper ranks of any Islamic organization, and are rather like the “Christmas and Easter” churchgoer , just average nobodies who otherwise has no real involvement/influence on their parish activities, priorities, or positions on issues.
These Muslims are called “Apostates” by every known form of Islam. The Prophet himself condemns them in no uncertain words, and they are ultimately slated for death as traitors to Allah. Their existence in the mean time is neutral, or used as a shield/ploy by the second type of Muslim.
B- Ideological supporters of Mohammad and his goals. That is to say, ones who believe in, support financially, and may personally participate in, terroristic activities against Infidels and their institutions. They will without conscious, kill and maim thousands of type “A” muslims if the effect will cause grief, blame, consternation or further expenditure of resources of the Infidels.
These Muslims are the ones who make up the leadership cadre of every “Islamic” organization worldwide. Being duplicitous, lying, and deceiving to bring down the Infidels is a tenet of their faith. They have no moral restraint when it comes to cooperation with, or obligation toward ,the object of their distain. Their speeches in Arabic to the masses, verses their “media message” to West, quite clearly reveals this two-faced aspect of their religion.
Among the American Muslim organizations, every move is planned to conceal their motives, every engagement with us used to keep us off balance. Some will actively play the part of “extremist” to create a false differential between them and the “moderates” who are their co-conspirators. This is done to encourage our “engagement” with the “moderates”, prove our willingness to co-exist, and somehow (in our imagination of wishful thinking) soothe and/or discredit the angry extremists, and ensure our safety.
For them, it is simply a case of the artificial relationship dynamic known as “good cop/bad cop”…in which the suspect (in this case, us) is caused to bring harm upon himself by aligning/cooperating with the lesser demands of the “good cop”, in the mistaken belief that honesty, accommodation, and an admission of SOME small sins will lead to a greater understanding of the whole…and the frightful charges pursued by “bad cop” will be seen as overboard and unjustified via this honestly demonstrated cooperation/friendship with the “good cop”. Mutual understanding thus achieved, we walk away each satisfied with the other.
We seek kinship with the lesser of the two evils, in the mistaken hope the greater evil will ratchet down their demands and accept us as “innocent”, not realizing the supposed “lesser evil” has the exact same intent (to show us no mercy) and this entire “interrogation” is choreographed between the two of them to ensure, as much as is possible, our ultimate doom.
It is, ironically, quite unfortunate that Jesus was a good person, and Mohammad such a thoroughly bad one…because the specter of “religious intolerance” at this point in human history hamstrings our ability see the simple the truth for what it is, and act accordingly.
In other words, would we, in the not so distant past, have “engaged” and/or promoted , at an OFFICIAL GOVERMENTAL OUTREACH LEVEL, “moderate” Nazi’s, Communists or Anarchists as “legitimate” voices in the dialog of our republic?
Poor, misunderstood, valuable, viable , positive and worthy pieces of the mosaic of our culture of freedom and self determination?
The Truth.
Stranger now, than Fiction.
The FBI couldn’t pour urine out of a boot with written instructions on the heel. If these people are supposed to be protecting us, we are in deep trouble. Who pays them anyway, Hamas, Al Queda, Iran or the Taliban?
There is a reason we refer to them as the Fumbling Bumbling Idiots!
Everyone here is correct. The FBI is terrible and we should privatize it. We should privatize all police forces. Or better yet, just expand our Second Amendment Rights and eliminate the FBI and police altogether.
Every organization is a mirror image of its leader. Who is the current leader of the DOJ? Who is Holder’s leader? Get it? All of this asinine silliness keeps us, the American public, at risk of further exposure to violence and mayhem. Mueller is a career diplo-cop who no longer has the stones to keep the FBI from morphing into another agency as silly and inept as Homeland Security: see leadership/mirror example above. Root ’83, you are very correct, and Brutus, while I do not agree with privatizing law enforcement at any level, I wholeheartedly agree with your 2nd amendment expansion (allow full auto weapons purchases for non-felons).
It is time to realize that the “enemy” that the FBI, ATF, TSA, CIA, et al is preparing to fight is the American citizen who cherishes his freedom and liberty. These G men are not our friends; they in fact work for our enemies and are dead set to destroy everything that the United States once represented.
Was it Mueller who didn’t know anything about the Muslim Brotherhood?