WASHINGTON, July 24 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Council on
American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) today called on the FBI and
Virginia's Tidewater Joint
Terrorism Task Force to explain why a leader of an anti-Islam hate
group was invited to offer training to state and federal law
enforcement officers.
[The Tidewater Joint Terrorism Task Force brings together
representatives from the FBI and local, state, military, and
federal agencies. SEE: http://norfolk.fbi.gov/partners.htm ]
Robert Spencer, co-founder of the
hate group Stop the Islamization of America (SIOA), claimed in a
blog post today that he "gave two two-hour seminars on the
belief-system of Islamic jihadists to the Tidewater Joint Terrorism
Task Force" on Wednesday. In a recent interview, Spencer referred
to Islam's Prophet Muhammad as a "con man."
SEE: Spencer and the God of the Sea
http://tinyurl.com/2u52m4h
Prophet Mohammed: A Con Man?
http://www.livingscoop.com/watch.php?v=NDQ4
"Our nation's law enforcement personnel should not receive
training from the head of a hate group that seeks to demonize Islam
and to prevent American Muslims from exercising their rights as
citizens," said CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper. "Robert
Spencer is the same individual who claims in his new book
that President Obama is waging 'war on America.'"
He noted that Spencer recently co-authored the book, "The
Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration's War on
America," that sounds a "wake-up call for Americans to stop the
Obama administration from limiting our hard-won freedoms, silencing
our democratic voices, and irreparably harming America for
generations to come."
Hooper said the United States Patent and Trademark Office
refused to grant SIOA a trademark because: "The applied-for mark
refers to Muslims in a disparaging manner because by definition it
implies that conversion or conformity to Islam is something that
needs to be stopped or caused to cease."
SOIA has come to prominence through shrill opposition to the
building of American mosques, anti-Islam bus and taxi advertising
campaigns, support for European far-right groups and Islamophobes
such as the English Defence League and Geert Wilders, and bigoted
anti-Islam statements by its co-leader, Pamela Geller.
SEE: SIOA is an Anti-Muslim Hate Group
http://tinyurl.com/29qfrns
Geller has claimed that "Hitler and the Nazis were inspired by
Islam" and offered rhetorical support to both accused Serbian war
criminal Radovan Karadzic and slain
Apartheid-era leader Eugene
Terre'blanche.
SEE: Pamela Geller: The Looniest
Blogger Ever
http://tinyurl.com/pamgellerloony
Pamela Geller Does Not Belong on National Television
http://mediamatters.org/research/201007140035
Geller and Spencer offered support for a call to wipe the nation
of Pakistan off the map using
India's nuclear weapons. They both
used their blogs to promote a video urging the mass killing of all
Pakistanis.
SEE: Pamela Geller and
Robert Spencer: Wipe Pakistan Off
the Map
http://www.loonwatch.com/tag/nuclear-holocaust/
Geller has posted images on her blog that include a fake
photograph of Supreme Court nominee Elena
Kagan in a Nazi uniform, another fake image of President
Obama urinating on an American flag and drawings purporting to
depict Islam's Prophet Muhammad as a pig. In a June 25 blog entry, Geller posted a video
claiming that Muslims engage in bestiality.
SIOA is an outgrowth of a similar group in Europe that seeks to block the construction of
mosques. That group, Stop the Islamization of Europe, "considers Islamophobia to be the
height of common sense."
This is not the first incident in which national security
personnel received anti-Islam training. The Naval Criminal
Investigative Service (NCIS) recently acknowledged that an
anti-Islam film should not have been used in training offered to
security personnel by that military law enforcement agency.
SEE: NCIS Tells CAIR Anti-Islam Film Not OK for Training
http://tinyurl.com/2e5eors
Earlier this year, CAIR's Washington
state chapter announced a webinar on security technology for
law enforcement personnel co-sponsored by Security Solutions
International (SSI) was canceled after two of the presenters
withdrew from the event due to community concerns about SSI's
anti-Islam bias.
CAIR is America's largest Muslim civil liberties and advocacy
organization. Its mission is to enhance the understanding of Islam,
encourage dialogue, protect civil liberties, empower American
Muslims, and build coalitions that promote justice and mutual
understanding.
Become a Fan of CAIR on Facebook
http://www.facebook.com/pages/CAIR/42590232694
Subscribe to CAIR's E-Mail List
http://tinyurl.com/cairsubscribe
CONTACT: CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper, 202-488-8787 or 202-744-7726,
E-Mail: ihooper@cair.com; CAIR Communications Coordinator
Amina Rubin, 202-488-8787,
202-341-4171, E-Mail: arubin@cair.com
SOURCE Council on American-Islamic Relations