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11 March 2011 By Juan Cole
Loonwatch was live blogging
the controversial (anti)-Muslim Hearings being chaired
by bigoted ex-IRA terrorist supporter Peter
King. It was a circus. It devolved along
partisan lines with Republicans predictably falling
behind the rhetoric and narrative of Peter King.
Democratic Congressmen/women issued strong rebukes: Rep.
Sheila J. Lee, Rep. Al Green, Rep. Keith Ellison, Rep.
Andre Carson, Rep. Laura Richardson, Rep. Sanchez,
and others delivered the message home that these
Hearings were nothing more than political theater
meant to castigate and intimidate a minority group and
most importantly they were bereft of facts and
therefore unbeneficial.
The leading witnesses for
King were non-experts, Zuhdi Jasser, AbdiRizak
Bihi and Melvin Bledsoe, all
of these individuals were bereft of any credentials or
expertise in the field of radicalization, terrorism or
extremism. Zuhdi Jasser is considered an apologist for
Neo-Cons and is viewed with suspicion amongst American
Muslims for his close association with Islamophobes
and war-mongerers. AbdiRizak was incomprehensible at
times and much of what he and Bledsoe said were
anecdotal and not factual evidence.
King began the hearings
with what can only be classified as a bigoted comment,
he said, "Moderate leadership must emerge from the
Muslim community." He said this to set up a straw
man argument for what would become a recurring attack
on CAIR, almost making it into a
hearing about CAIR.
After getting its name
wrong, calling it the "Committee of American
Islamic Relations," he and other Congressmen
labeled CAIR a Hamas and Muslim Brotherhood group.
This is the usual trope brought forth by Right-wingers
and anti-Muslims such as Robert Spencer and co., the
best response came from Sheriff Lee Baca
(one of the anti-Loons of 2010) when he said, ‘If
CAIR is this terrorist group or has terrorist links
then why hasn't the FBI prosecuted them? Why haven't
they charged them? They wouldn't be around if they
were terrorist or terrorist sympathizers.'
Some highlights included:
-Keith Ellison
made three important points: 1.) Security is important
to all American Muslims, 2.) Hearings threaten our
security and 3.) We need increased engagement with
Muslims.
Ellison also got quite
emotional while mentioning the story of a Muslim first
responder who died saving people but was the victim of
a smear campaign by Islamophobes who attempted to link
him to the 9/11 attacks.
-Andre Carson
brought up an excellent point about the fact that
cooperation between law enforcement and communities
such as the American Muslim community is endangered by
the backdoor actions and methodologies of
organizations such as the FBI when they send agent
provocateurs into Muslim mosques. Such actions cause
distrust and engender fear that Muslims' civil rights
and liberties are being violated. One really only has
to look at the example in California of the criminal
Craig Montielh who was later arrested and confessed
that he was sent by the FBI on a fishing expedition to
entrap Muslims.
There were also other quite
interesting WTF moments: Such as when Peter King
mentioned Kim Kardashian and CAIR in the same
sentence. Or when non-expert witness Melvin Bledsoe
told Rep. Al Green "you don't know what these hearings
are about." There was also the earlier moment when
Peter King denied making the comment that "there
are too many mosques in
America."
A blatant falsity.
We will have more in
depth coverage but it is safe to say that
American Muslims are in for a rocky Islamophobic time
with these hearings |
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