Yesterday the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) held a press conference detailing new evidence about spies paid to surveil Muslims. CAIR’s findings show that an anti-Muslim group, working with the Israeli government, spied on prominent Muslims and Muslim organizations for over a decade.
Last month the group fired Romin Iqbal, the former Executive and Legal Director for one of its Ohio chapters, after it discovered that he was sharing audio recordings and confidential information with the Investigative Project on Terrorism (IPT). IPT was founded by the infamous Islamophobic author Steven Emerson and has been referred to as “a leading source of anti-Muslim racism.” CAIR said the IPT was “communicating with and providing assistance to Israeli intelligence with the office of then-Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.”
Whitney Siddiqi, the CAIR-Ohio community affairs director, called the revelations a “complete betrayal” at the time.
According to CAIR, two additional individuals have come forward to confess that they have spied on behalf of IPT. One is a Virginia Muslim named Tariq Nelson who was paid by the hate group from 2008 through 2012 and the other is an IPT whistleblower who detailed how the organization gathered confidential information in an effort to protect the Israeli government.
“The fact that anti-Muslim bigots and anti-Palestinian racists have invested so much time and effort in spying on our community is a sign of the importance of our community,” said CAIR National Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell in a statement. “These hate groups are terrified that American Muslims will use our political activism, civic engagement and legal work to advance justice here and around the world. They’re right to be afraid because that’s exactly what we’ve been doing and will continue to do, God willing.”
At the press conference CAIR presented statements from both individuals, proof that IPT paid one of the spies for their work, tax documents outlining IPT’s major donors, and a dossier that IPT compiled on former Representative, and current Minnesota Attorney General, Keith Ellison.
According to an exclusive report on the scandal in the Washington Post, Tariq Nelson was the person who recorded critical remarks that Ellison made about Israel at a 2010 fundraiser. That recording was leaked by IPT and used by anti-Palestinian groups to help block him from becoming chairman of the Democratic National Committee in 2016.
Ellison didn’t address the political impact of the recording in his comments to the Post, but he acknowledge that the issue of Muslim surveillance was an important one. “The truth about the long campaign of disinformation — spying on Muslims engaged in legitimate First Amendment activity, paying people tens of thousands of dollars to conduct smear campaigns based on deception — continues to come out,” he told the paper. “If the last 10 years have shown us anything, it is that the so-called ‘Muslim scare’ was always deliberate disinformation pitting Americans against each other.”
“Keith Ellison was IPT’s main target for many years,” said CAIR National Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell during the press conference. “They compiled a massive dossier on him, targeting his public and private remarks, his speeches, his articles. They were trying to find anything they could to undermine this inspiring black, Muslim politician. They were spying on him for years.”
“I would like to take this opportunity to call on the Justice Department, on the FBI, on the U.S. Treasury to investigate and hold Steven Emerson and the Investigative Project on Terrorism accountable,” said CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad. “Why is he allowed to spy for a foreign entity in service to the state of Israel? Spying on American Muslims, on legal organizations should not be allowed and I hope that the Justice Department will take this call very seriously.”
Ah yes, “Israel, a light unto nations (NOT!)”
https://mailchi.mp/bcc05b903eb7/statement-by-civil-society-concerning-israels-assault-on-birzeit-university?e=fab044e9
“Statement by Civil Society Concerning Israel’s Assault on Birzeit University”
“We, the undersigned national figures and civil society organizations, vehemently condemn the Israeli occupation forces’ criminal assault on Birzeit University on 10 January 2022. The Israeli forces raided – namely, the Birzeit University campus, firing live ammunition, injuring students, and abducting and detaining several of them. We hold the occupation authorities fully responsible for the safety of the incarcerated students and demand their immediate release.
“This abhorrent crime requires immediate international intervention to provide protection for the Palestinan people as well as Palestinian academic and cultural institutions. It also requires that all Palestinians, individuals and organizations, to rally to the defense of Birzeit University, a distinguished national and academic institution. Birzeit University prides itself on its established and rich history of political and intellectual diversity and inclusion, while practicing and defending participatory democracy, making it a cornerstone in Palestinian resilience as well as the resistance to the occupation. In this context, we call for focusing our collective efforts and energies on confronting the Israeli aggression and denying the occupier the opportunity to undermine and weaken our institutions or meddle in our internal affairs.
“We also urge for continued internal dialogue within the university and in a manner that guarantees the resolution of any internal disputes and allows for the prompt resumption of academic life on campus. “
(Folowed by a lengthy list of signatures)
No surprise. Israel has years of experience in spying, from Pollard to their spyware, and their internet trolls, have always shown their hatred for Arabs and Muslims, put it all together and they are suspect Number One. They are maestro’s in spying and they even spy on the nation that sends them the most aid and weapons, and we keep showering them with unwavering love and tax payer money.
“WASHINGTON — The iPhones of 11 U.S. Embassy employees working in Uganda were hacked using spyware developed by Israel’s NSO Group, the surveillance firm that the United States blacklisted a month ago because it said the technology had been used by foreign governments to repress dissent, several people familiar with the breach said on Friday.”
Nothing Israel does should surprise anyone, all what they accuse Iran of, you can be sure they are guilty of the crimes themselves, or worse. The most despicable nation in the ME that calls itself a “democracy”. Imagine their howls of outrage, and the whining, coming from the Israeli government and their lobbies here, had this been Iran working with an anti-semitic/anti Jewish group. Oy vey!
Who edits this correspondent’s articles?
You shouldn’t write “spys” in the sub-heading. It just makes it look as if you don’t know how to spell.
Here your reader is wondering, how does the act of gathering information protect a government?
Looking at the CAIR statement, I see that it says:
So now that makes sense: IPT was gathering information on critics of the Israeli government in order to undermine them and hence make them less effective in their criticism. You should have made that clearer in your report, instead of copying a phrase from the CAIR statement without its context.