Guest Article - CAIR's Corruption

CAIR’s Firing of Juan Williams
By Rich Trzpek of Frontpage Magazine

"There are two parts to the Juan Williams story that broke last week. Part one of course involves NPR [National Public Radio] abandoning any pretense of impartiality in its rush to fire a journalist who isn’t in lockstep with their leftist worldview. But the other part of this story is just as important: the role that the Council on American Islamic Relations played in the sorry affair. CAIR’s bullying tactics were a big part of the reason that NPR took such dramatic action so quickly, without even bothering to get Williams’ side of the story. The reaction to Williams’ firing across all parts of the political spectrum has been one of disgust and anger, which isn’t exactly what CAIR bargained for. They figured they could play the victim card once more and Americans would dutifully shed crocodile tears over their plight. Now that the magnitude of the backlash against NPR is plain to see, CAIR spokesmen are trying to distance themselves from the decision. But, they can’t. This assault on free speech has CAIR’s fingerprints all over it.

On Wednesday afternoon CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad sent out a press release denouncing Williams, saying: 'Such irresponsible and inflammatory comments would not be tolerated if they targeted any other racial, ethnic or religious minority, and they should not pass without action by NPR.' Soon after, NPR CEO Vivian Schiller dutifully bowed to CAIR’s harassment by terminating the network’s relationship with Juan Williams. Like most leftists, Schiller seems to laboring under the misapprehension that CAIR is what it purports to be: a civil rights organization. The truth is, of course, far more sinister.

'Although it presents itself as a civil rights group, CAIR actually has numerous links to Islamic supremacist and jihad groups,' affirms Robert Spencer of JihadWatch.org. He continues:

'CAIR founders Omar Ahmad and Niwad Awad were present at a Hamas planning meeting in Philadelphia in 1993 where they and other Hamas operatives conspired to raise funds for Hamas and to promote jihad in the Middle East. CAIR has steadfastly refused to denounce Hamas and Hizballah as terrorist groups. CAIR also was involved in the Flying Imams’ intimidation suit against the passengers who reported their suspicious behavior. CAIR has a long record of duplicity and deception. Although it has received millions of dollars in donations from foreign Islamic entities, it has not registered as a foreign agent as required by the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), despite spreading Islamic supremacist propaganda within the United States.'

In an interview with Megyn Kelly that aired on Fox, CAIR spokesman Ibrahim Hooper tried to deny that his organization had anything to do with Williams getting fired. Well, sort of. Hooper spoke with a wink and nod towards his supporters, while he lamely explained that NPR is a leftist media outlet and Williams’ opinions were probably more in concert with a network like Fox anyway. It was probably the only honest statement that Hooper made during the entire interview, although when Kelly pounced on the remark he deftly sidestepped. When Kelly asked for confirmation that Hooper believes that NPR represents the left, Hooper just ignored the question. The more revealing statement is one that Hooper made just after Williams and NPR parted ways, when he observed that 'everybody’s accountable for their words and their actions…'

The smoking gun in this sordid affair is the fact that Vivian Schiller clearly took CAIR’s denunciation of Williams at face value and then promptly took the coward’s way out, refusing to even hear Williams’ side of the story. Were Williams’ comments 'irresponsible and inflammatory' as CAIR claimed? Not to anyone outside of an organization with ties to the Muslim Brotherhood or the hypersensitive far left. In fact, any reasonable person who listened to the entire exchange between Juan Williams and Bill O’Reilly would conclude that Williams was bending over backwards to defend Muslims and to argue against any sort of profiling. Would comments like these have been tolerated if they involved '…any other racial, ethnic or religious minority'? Without a doubt. We live in a nation where Jewish and Christian stereotypes are routinely used to lampoon, revile and insult those religions. American Jews and Christians deal with it, because we are secure with ourselves and with our faiths. Moreover, Jews and Christians don’t have a poorly-disguised political agenda intertwined with our religions. There is no need to make our faith above criticism in order to justify the slow incursion of religious law into our secular form of government.

That’s not the case when it comes to CAIR. The more they can make Islam out of bounds for any sort of criticism, the easier it is to introduce more elements of Sharia law within western society. As Omar Ahmad, CAIR’s co-founder and longtime Board Chairman, was quoted as saying in 1998: 'Islam isn’t in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant. The Koran should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on Earth.'

If CAIR and other Islamic apologists really wanted to defuse American fears about their intentions, they would have welcomed Williams’ observations. The fact he said that seeing someone dressed in Muslim garb at the airport makes him nervous reflects the feelings of tens of millions of Americans. It is true that if a Muslim terrorist was going to try to blow up an airliner, he would likely do so while dressed in western attire rather than his home nation’s fashion, but that’s hardly the point. Seeing a Muslim dressed in the style of clothing unique to his religion and his particular culture is an uncomfortable reminder that there are Muslims out there – perhaps not this one, but undeniably someone – who would dearly love to enter paradise sporting a 9/11 merit badge. Megyn Kelly repeatedly pressed Ibrahim Hooper on this point. If CAIR truly wants to promote understanding and peace, why in the world would it denounce a respected journalist – a liberal no less – who was simply expressing the feelings that so many Americans share? Why not use Williams’ candor as a jumping off point to establish a real, meaningful dialogue, instead of trying to silence and marginalize Williams and anyone who shares his legitimately held feelings?

Hooper didn’t have an answer to that pointed, legitimate query, but Megyn Fox filled in the blank for him. 'You don’t want dialogue, sir', she said. 'You called for punitive action against him.' And action is what CAIR got. What they didn’t anticipate, and what they are now surely regretting, is that every action elicits a reaction, and this particular reaction isn’t going their way at all."