The Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) has jumped in on the effort to paint its opponents as “Islamophobes,” the latest twist in the Left’s never-ending effort to smear opponents with names like “racist,” “xenophobe,” etc. And while this repulsive strategy makes a mockery of the First Amendment and has reduced American political dialogue to infantile, elementary school name-calling, its true goal is to marginalize, deplatform and defund its opponents, especially those that pose a threat to its subversive agenda. This paper exposes for all to see, just how transparently dishonest and hypocritical CAIR and its allies in the Red-Green Axis truly are in this their latest “Islamophbia” report, and links them to the worldwide effort of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation to impose blasphemy laws against anyone who would speak ill of any aspect of Islam.
The Left has become increasingly aggressive about silencing its critics. In late June 2019, James O’Keefe’s Project Veritas released its latest undercover video showing Google’s frightening institutional bias and its apparent intention to manipulate public opinion to influence the 2020 elections. Google is just one of many on the Left seeking to mislead, discredit, defame, and silence the Left’s opponents. But they are not alone. In what we have called the Red-Green Axis, Islamic groups in the U.S. and abroad have partnered with the Left to silence anyone who questions any aspect of Islam, including Islamic terrorism. The Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) recently published its latest effort in a piece titled Hijacked by Hate: American Philanthropy and the Islamophobia Network.
It would be a joke, but it isn’t funny. “Islamophobia” is the latest in a long list of contrived “phobias” invented by the Left and its Muslim allies to continue the Left’s time-honored vilification tactic. It is an unscrupulous, intellectually dishonest way of dealing with legitimate criticism that has reduced political discourse in the U.S. to infantile, elementary school name-calling. The Left owns this outcome, but the Muslims are catching up.
First, we must ask: what is “Islamophobia?” Well, CAIR doesn’t exactly say. That is understandable, because if they told you what it means, you would laugh out loud. But one of their collaborators was honest enough to put it in a Facebook post (which wasn’t blocked by Facebook, BTW, unlike some posts critical of Islam). Here’s a screen shot of the post.
Meanwhile, we have Boko Haram’s gruesome mass slaughters in Nigeria, Al-Shabaab engaged in mass terror attacks in Somalia and Kenya, Abu Sayyaf kidnapping and murdering in the Philippines, countless individual and group acts of barbaric terrorism throughout the West, and the Islamic State beheadings everywhere – all doctrinally justified by the Qur’an, Sunna and Islamic Law (shariah).
If this is not Islam, then Islam is the most misunderstood religion in world history. There is literally no parallel in any other religion—although it should be noted that, according to a widely-used textbook in U.S. madrassas (Islamic schools), indeed, “Islam is not a religion,” but rather a complete way of life. And while we struggle to cope with this deadly onslaught, CAIR and its proxies are aggressively inserting Islamic teachings in public schools (while Christianity is equally aggressively banned), engaging in relentless lawsuits attempting to insinuate Islamic Law into U.S. courts, colluding with the Left in its various acts of subversion and sedition, and viciously attacking anyone who protests.
No, Esam, we are not the haters. You are! And your list is a bad joke, especially as it contains terms like jihad and terrorism that are to be found throughout the Islamic canon (notably the Qur’an itself!), as well as the perfectly doctrinal assertion about Islam not being a religion.
But it’s no joke. He is serious. And this is not just anyone. Esam Omeish is “Chief of General and Laparoscopic Surgery” at INOVA Alexandria Virginia hospital. Omeish is a former leader of the Muslim Students Association (MSA) and the Muslim American Society (MAS) — both prominent Muslim Brotherhood groups. He is also a founding board member of the Dar al Hijra mosque in Falls Church, VA.
Dar al Hijra’s former Imam is the infamous Anwar al-Awlaki — mentor to Fort Hood terrorist, Nidal Hassan and others. Al-Awlaki was later killed in a CIA drone strike in Yemen. Hassan, along with two of the 9-11 terrorists, attended the mosque during 2001, when Awlaki was Imam. Another attendee was Ahmed Omar Abu Ali, an al-Qaeda member convicted of attempting to assassinate President George W. Bush.
Can we say Islamic Terrorists?
If we do, we are… wait for it… Islamophobes! It turns out that this compendium merely details what the Organization for Islamic Cooperation defines as Islamophobia. The OIC is the world’s largest Islamic group, and the second largest intergovernmental organization in the world — including 56 nations and the Palestinian Authority. It wields substantial influence over the United Nations, and was able to convince the U.N. to insert its blasphemy definitions into UN Resolution 16/18, Combating intolerance, negative stereotyping and stigmatization of, and discrimination, incitement to violence and violence against persons based on religion or belief.
Would that include “negative stereotyping” or violence against Christians and Jews? Ah, no. It is all about Islam, the only “religion” the U.N. has ever cared about. And according to Islamic Law, anything that gives offense to Muslims by criticizing Islam in any way whatsoever, whether true or false, is slander – a criminal, even capital, offense against Islam. If, for example, you criticize Islam for Islamic terrorism, you are guilty of “incitement to violence.” So Islamic terrorism is our fault! According to the OIC, this kind of talk should be criminally prosecuted under Islamic blasphemy & slander laws, and while Resolution 16/18 pays lip service to free speech concepts, its true goal is to criminalize speech critical of Islam.
These people are the real haters. Let’s be clear about that. And they express their hate by trying to destroy those who expose them, meanwhile living comfortably in the most generous, free, affluent nation in the world. They define the term “parasite.”
So, let’s expose this “Islamophobia” report for the fraud it is. Its purpose is to attack those foundations providing income for CAIR’s enemies, the so-called “Islamophobia Network,” to starve them out of existence. As Center for Security Policy (CSP) Vice President for Research and Analysis Clare M. Lopez wrote in May 2019, “the clear intent of the report and the list is to provide a target list of philanthropic organizations to be shamed, shunned, and ultimately pressured into divesting from support of those groups deemed by CAIR to be “Islamophobic.”
CAIR claims that this network benefits from donations made through shadowy organizations called Donor-advised Funds. There are numerous such funds, including Fidelity, Schwab, Tides, Proteus, Vanguard, and others. These funds allow donors to remain anonymous. In today’s hyper-partisan atmosphere, where the Left and its Muslim allies are constantly seeking to expose, doxx and threaten donors, who can blame them?
But how can CAIR criticize others? CAIR gets money from Schwab and Proteus, according to Foundation Search. And while it has not received anything from Fidelity or Vanguard recently, many of its Muslim Brotherhood allies have. The Islamic Society of North America has received $176,600 from Fidelity, and $79,500 from Vanguard. The U.S. Council of Muslim Organizations (USCMO), Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA), the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC) and the Muslim Legal Fund of America (MLFA), also receive donations from Fidelity and/or Schwab.
In fact, Vanguard, Schwab, Fidelity, Tides and other donor-advised funds are major financiers of the Left, and donations to non-Left groups are tiny by comparison. CAIR’s characterization of these funding sources is a fraudulent misdirection in this report. CAIR’s true goal in publishing this screed is to intimidate those funds from offering any money at all to CAIR’s political enemies.
CAIR’s Xenophobe Network
CAIR’s report claims that 39 xenophobic “hate” groups comprise a nefarious network receiving “billions” in “dark money” from those evil donor-advised funds. Never mind their definition. This is an absurd exaggeration, and it is factually incorrect:
- There were 46 groups listed in the report, not Can CAIR even count? NPR endorsed this report: Can NPR count? Did they even bother?
- Collectively, these 46 groups received approximately $1.4 billion over three years – about $450 million in one year, not “billions.”
- Two-thirds of this income was received by one organization, Pat Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN).
Hard to fathom, but yes, CAIR considers the 700 Club to be part of a vast, dark “Islamophobia” network.
But let’s consider: if CBN’s annual income is removed, the other 45 receive an annual total of $145.1 million/year. It becomes immediately apparent why CBN was included. Without it, CAIR cannot us the “B” word, and even with it they have to count up three years. Of course, the CAIR report does not break the numbers out by organization, so you wouldn’t automatically know that most of this “network” was in fact the 700 Club.
Spread across the 45 organizations, excluding CBN, gives an average annual revenue of $3.2 million each. Literally, a hill of beans in the non-profit world, and nothing like the billions in funding received by the Left.
See the table below. Figures are taken from each organization’s nonprofit tax returns (linked in the table). While they pay no taxes, they are still required to file, but sometimes file quite late. All of the figures in the table below and the other tables in this report for that matter, were taken from the most recent tax return, usually 2016 or 2017, but a few were for 2018.
|
CAIR’s $1.5 Billion Xenophobe Network |
|
|
|
Net |
|
|
Revenues |
Assets |
| 1 |
Christian Broadcasting Network |
$308,099,729 |
$142,691,721 |
| 2 |
American Future Fund |
$29,401,632 |
$2,838,387 |
| 3 |
American Center for Law and Justice |
$22,801,099 |
$1,224,787 |
| 4 |
American Family Association |
$19,068,393 |
$28,683,191 |
| 5 |
Foundation for Defense of Democracies |
$9,039,436 |
$18,973,604 |
| 6 |
Center for Security Policy |
$6,548,493 |
$1,967,835 |
| 7 |
Middle East Media Research Institute |
$6,262,533 |
$1,532,913 |
| 8 |
David Horowitz Freedom Center |
$5,976,459 |
$650,572 |
| 9 |
National Review Institute |
$5,689,857 |
$9,660,370 |
| 10 |
Concerned Women for America |
$5,596,942 |
$191,832 |
| 11 |
Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting |
$5,363,477 |
$7,632,375 |
| 12 |
Middle East Forum |
$4,361,751 |
$5,463,633 |
| 13 |
American Civil Rights Union |
$3,119,465 |
$1,250,047 |
| 14 |
Clarion Project |
$3,005,986 |
$2,074,817 |
| 15 |
Gatestone Institute |
$2,159,819 |
$120,750 |
| 16 |
Investigative Project on Terrorism |
$2,056,982 |
-$137,257 |
| 17 |
Eagle Forum & Defense Fund (10 Chapters) |
$1,810,441 |
$29,351,809 |
| 18 |
Religious Freedom Coalition |
$1,529,083 |
$438,276 |
| 19 |
Lawfare Project |
$1,392,062 |
$790,780 |
| 20 |
American Freedom Law Center |
$1,276,078 |
$530,871 |
| 21 |
Christian Action Network |
$1,098,170 |
$80,590 |
| 22-46 |
All Others |
$8,298,096 |
$7,045,532 |
|
TOTAL |
$453,955,983 |
$263,057,435 |
Most of these groups are involved in many and different issues: so, to call them part of any kind of “network” is absurd. Consider the National Review (NR) for example. Founded by William F. Buckley, NR is one of the oldest conservative publications in the U.S. Except for a few writers, it is also one of the last Never-Trump holdouts. The Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD)? How about the American Future Fund (AFF)? AFF turns out to be a group that promotes “conservative, free market ideals.” That does not sound “Islamophobic” to me.
Besides being groups that CAIR/SPLC hates there is actually little, if any connection, among these 46 groups. Not a “network” of any kind, let alone “dark.”
Only four make over $10 million/year. Most struggle just to keep their doors open. More than half (represented by line 22-46) are not even worth mentioning separately. Combined, these 25 organizations realized just $8.3 million in their latest year. That averages out to about $332,000 each. Some earn less than $100,000. Two take in nothing at all. Most have only one or a few staff members. This vast network looks more and more like a guppy the closer you look.
Finally, the role of donor-advised funds is exaggerated. For example, of approximately $24 million CBN has received from various donors since 1999 according to Foundation Search, less than 18 percent came from donor-advised funds. Most of the rest came from individual family foundations, Christian foundations, and others. Conversely, CAIR’s network of conspirators, which I have dubbed the Red-Green Axis, thrives on donor-advised dollars.
So, CAIR’s characterization of this “Xenophobe network” is fraudulent on its face. It is also indicative of the group’s shoddy workmanship — alone enough to mistrust its assertions. So, let’s now take a look at CAIR’s Red-Green Axis network. This really is a multi-billion-dollar network. And you don’t even have to add years.
| CAIR’s Multi-Billion Dollar Red/Green Axis Network |
|
|
|
|
Annual |
Net |
| Islamic Groups |
Revenues |
Assets |
| ACCESS |
$27,488,567 |
$37,871,650 |
| CAIR & CAIR Foundation |
$14,026,522 |
$11,663,463 |
| Islamic Circle of North America |
$8,351,219 |
$20,337,153 |
| International Institute of Islamic Thought |
$7,559,412 |
$963,220 |
| Muslim American Society |
$4,381,563 |
$3,676,152 |
| Muslim Legal Fund of America |
$3,576,412 |
$71,496 |
| Islamic Society of North America |
$3,481,603 |
$1,601,028 |
| Muslim Advocates |
$2,376,533 |
$1,553,085 |
| MPAC Foundation |
$2,093,657 |
$1,084,022 |
| Pillars Fund |
$1,906,122 |
$2,015,940 |
| Constitutional Law Center for Muslims |
$1,700,636 |
$17,225 |
| Muslim Public Affairs Council |
$1,552,024 |
$417,529 |
| North American Foundation of Islamic Services |
$1,248,598 |
$814,284 |
| Council of Islamic Organizations |
$937,397 |
$611,099 |
| EMGAGE Foundation |
$740,752 |
$199,613 |
| Assembly of Muslim Jurists in America |
$330,871 |
$384,048 |
| U.S. Council of Muslim Organizations |
$100,795 |
$3,434 |
| Washington Trust Foundation, Inc. |
$13,896 |
$4,923,358 |
| North American Islamic Trust* |
NA |
$300,000,000 |
| Subtotal |
$81,866,579 |
$388,207,799 |
| |
|
|
| Collaborators & Supporters |
|
|
| American Civil Liberties Union |
$380,810,055 |
$470,408,742 |
| ACLU Foundation |
$146,251,550 |
$342,625,524 |
| Southern Poverty Law Center |
$136,373,624 |
$449,834,593 |
| Anti-Defamation League |
$65,971,077 |
-$16,541,031 |
| Industrial Areas Foundation |
$6,028,449 |
$4,792,009 |
| TOTAL |
$817,301,334 |
$1,639,327,636 |
| * Assets estimate based on news reports. No public information exists. |
Compare and contrast this network with CAIR’s contrived Xenophobe “network.” Virtually all of the listed Muslim groups are Muslim Brotherhood fronts. Many, including CAIR, are also named by the Justice Department as unindicted co-conspirators in the 2008 Holy Land Foundation HAMAS terror financing trial — the largest of its kind in the U.S.
The SPLC and ACLU work hand in glove with CAIR all the time. In fact, SPLC’s Heidi Beirich contributed to the CAIR report. No wonder it is such shoddy work. The ALCU’s conservative counterpart is Jay Sekulow’s American Center for Law and Justice. The ACLJ received $22.8 million, according to its most recent IRS filing. The ACLU amassed over $500 million in the same year, 23 times that of ALCJ. Kind of like Sasquatch being attacked by a gnat. Saul Alinsky’s Industrial Areas Foundation and even the ADL are now working with these Islamic groups as well.
The Six “Islamophobes” CAIR Really Hates
CAIR singles out six “Islamophobe” groups for particular animus. CAIR claims in the report that they have collectively received $125 million from various funders (including those evil donor-advised funds). Where did they get all that money? CAIR provides no citations or explanations in the report. You just have to take their word for it. These groups receive nothing like that, even if you add up multiple years. Here are the facts from each organization’s most recent tax return:
| CAIR’s $125 Million Islamophobia Network |
|
|
|
|
|
Net |
|
Revenues |
Assets |
| ACT for America |
$128,631 |
$1,053,938 |
| American Freedom Defense Initiative |
$405,658 |
$516,119 |
| American Freedom Law Center |
$1,276,078 |
$530,871 |
| Center for Security Policy |
$6,548,493 |
$1,967,835 |
| David Horowitz Freedom Center |
$5,976,459 |
$650,572 |
| Middle East Forum |
$4,361,751 |
$5,463,633 |
| TOTAL |
$18,697,070 |
$10,182,968 |
Whoops! Not quite $125 million, eh? Unlike CAIR, you can check my work by simply clicking on the hyperlinks in those tables. Most of these groups are living on a shoestring budget. CAIR knows this but purposely doesn’t mention it.
So how much does poor little CAIR take in annually? Look at the Red-Green Axis table. All by itself, CAIR receives $14.0 million annually through its foundation and network of offices, and has amassed $11.6 million in net assets, more than the six “Islamophobes” combined.
Additionally, an organization called the Washington Trust Foundation, holds another $5 million in real estate assets owned by CAIR. In its own words, the Washington Trust’s purpose is “To support the purposes of CAIR Foundation, Inc….” And guess who runs the Trust? None other than “Islamophobe” expert Esam Omeish.
But why single out these six small organizations for particular attention? That’s where the rubber meets the road, because while almost all of the 46 organizations listed in the Islamophobia Network table focus on a broad range of issues, and are not “networked” in any meaningful way, those six singled out for particular vilification are the ones that have been very effective at exposing and pushing back against CAIR’s subversive onslaught.
Take David Yerushalmi’s American Freedom Law Center (AFLC). It has battled CAIR in court numerous times and has never lost a case against them. This tiny organization with half a million in assets, has forced CAIR to pony up millions for its misguided lawfare.
For example, CAIR has agreed to pay significant legal fees and other compensation to plaintiffs in two cases represented by the AFLC: a June 2019 Virginia case and an April 2019 case in Oklahoma. Both cases revealed CAIR engaging in significant fraud against the plaintiffs. And each time, CAIR relented when it became clear that the alternative was to carry the case to trial. Going to trial would expose CAIR to a close examination of its terrorist connections and subversive agenda. CAIR demurred.
CAIR is plainly not a “social welfare” organization, a designation required for 501.c.3 tax-exempt designation. They are afraid of losing it, and these six organizations are a major threat. They have been effectively exposing CAIR’s association with terrorists (especially the Palestinian terrorist group, HAMAS), and the subversive agenda that follows the Muslim Brotherhood “Civilization Jihad” plan for the Brotherhood in America, specifically:
The Ikhwan [Muslim Brotherhood] must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and “sabotaging” its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.
In response, what is CAIR’s vile, unethical answer? Savage these groups and their funders in an attempt to starve them of funding. What would CAIR do if it had the unbeatable political power it is hoping to obtain with the Left’s help? One shudders to think.
With the media, Hollywood, the education establishment, and a major political party totally owned by the hard Left and more than willing to echo your messages, destroying your opponents through defamation is a pretty good business model, too. All you need do is abandon all ethics, integrity, morality, and any interest in the truth. Right up Nihad Awad’s alley, and he has made $723,000 over the past three yearsdoing so.
Branches and off-shoots of the Muslim Brotherhood are responsible for virtually all Islamic terrorism in the world. In a declassified secret FBI memo, an informant disclosed that the Muslim Brotherhood’s “ultimate goal is to enforce, by ‘violence if necessary,’ the Islamic Revolution on all non-Islamic Governments,” including the United States.
This Islamophobia report is just the latest in a long line of assaults by CAIR and Co. against their political enemies. It is a form of pre-violent-stage terrorism that does not yet kill individuals directly but attempts to destroy their ability to earn an income and continue their work, while intimidating would-be allies.
A not insignificant number of individuals associated with CAIR have been convictedof terrorism-related charges over the years, although the Muslim Brotherhood has chosen to avoid terrorism in favor of subversion in the U.S. because it is a more effective strategy for the moment. CAIR’s Awad has publicly allied himself with both the PLO and HAMAS terrorist groups in the past, and CAIR refuses to denounce HAMAS.
As urgent as international threats undeniably are and will continue to be, top level U.S. national security leadership attention must be turned to the domestic insurgency threat posed by the subversive, jihadist agenda of the Muslim Brotherhood and the rest of the Islamic Movement in this country. CAIR is undoubtedly the lead Brotherhood front group driving this threat, but its top position within the U.S. Council of Muslim Organizations (USCMO) and, in turn, its close working relationship with the pro-Muslim Brotherhood, HAMAS-supporting regime of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, add a further and foreign dimension to the threat that must not be ignored.
To counter this threat, the U.S. government must reverse the Great Purge of 2011-2012, which, under Brotherhood supervision, removed all training curricula as well as language from official USG usage that accurately identified the inspirational/motivational role of Islamic doctrine for all Islamic terrorism. The professional instructors who once taught this enemy threat doctrine and their courses must be restored government-wide, with USG backing and funding.
Finally, the declassification of PSD-11 (Presidential Study Directive 11), which reportedly in 2010 laid forth the blueprint for the Obama administration’s new supportive relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood, is an absolute priority. Absent its declassification, it will remain impossible for those responsible to be held fully to account and very difficult to reverse its ongoing malign effects on our national security.
The Trump administration must confront the Muslim Brotherhood’s many tentacles in the U.S. Federal law enforcement should begin a renewed effort to investigate Brotherhood groups in the U.S. and at the very least, revoke CAIR’s tax exempt status. It is plain from this report that CAIR is not a “civil rights” organization, but one intent on imposing the Muslim Brotherhood’s malevolent “…grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and ‘sabotaging’ its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers…
