Israeli racism and the role of the American Jewish leadership

The last few weeks have exposed the world to a new wave of racism and apartheid practices by Israel against its non-Jewish citizens. In this post, I will not discuss past and existing apartheid-like practices that target Israel's indigenous Palestinian and non-Jewish populations, such as the apartheid-wall, for-Jews-only neighborhoods/cities/colonies, for-Jews-only rights, for-Jews-only jobs, denial of right of return for non-Jewish refugees, etc. That can be a discussion for another day.

In the most recent developments, a couple of weeks ago the Israeli cabinet approved a new law requiring new non-Jewish citizens to take a loyalty oath to Israel as a “Jewish state.”  The proposal was denounced by many Jewish and non-Jewish leaders around the world, some of whom described the measure as "fascist.”

Then yesterday, a group of rabbis from the city of Safed issued a letter urging Jews to refrain from renting apartments to Arabs. And today, Israeli newspapers reported that a leading Israeli rabbi, Ovadia Yosef, gave a sermon on Saturday in which he stated that God created non-Jews only to serve Jews.

It is important that we as Americans challenge such practices because the whole world sees our country as the sponsor and strongest unconditional defender of Israel and its policies. Israel's immoral practices taint the credibility and image of our country and serve to fuel anti-American sentiment among the world's populations. As a country and people that repeatedly struggled and fought to end slavery, racism, bigotry, and apartheid at home and abroad, we have an important role to play in pressuring Israel to end such practices.  

Let me be clear: no one should ever blame Jews or Judaism for the outrageous Israeli practices, even as Israel falsely claims to be THE "Jewish" state.

The American Jewish community, as a leading community in the struggle against discrimination and bigotry in America, is in a unique position to expose Israel's shameful attempts to justify its war crimes and racist actions falsely in the name of Judaism.

There are many Jewish people who challenge Israel’s bigotry, and I applaud the heroic rabbis and activists who never remained silent in face of Israel's brutality and racism.

Unfortunately, in our country there are still some who prefer to engage in Muslim bashing rather than on securing equal rights and equal treatment for all. The ADL, once a leader in defending civil rights, seems recently to have changed its mission to becoming the lead advocate for the Israeli right-wing government. I pray that the ADL will now take a break from its efforts to advocate restrictions on the rights of Muslims to worship freely in America and direct some of its resources toward promoting peace, justice and harmony in Israel and the world.

For the sake of America, for the sake of peace and justice in the Holy Land, and for the sake of good and harmonious relations between Muslims and Jews, the ADL needs to stop attacking Islam and Muslims and instead start challenging the racism of Israel.

American Jews and American Muslims can and must continue to work together to challenge anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and all forms of injustices perpetrated by those who claim to follow our respective religions. Both communities must join hands to show our children a brighter future in the Holy Land - a future that is built on justice, mutual respect, equality, and peace for all people.

Shilling for the Israeli Occupation: The ADL's New Mission Statement? - By: Ahmed Rehab

By: Ahmed Rehab
Executive Director of CAIR-Chicago
The Huffington Post


The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), fresh off of several PR gaffes, recently managed to pull off another head-scratching moment by compiling and releasing a list of the "top ten most influential anti-Israel groups in America."

In other words, an organization that describes itself as "the nation's premier civil rights/human relations agency that fights anti-Semitism and all forms of bigotry, defends democratic ideals and protects civil rights for all" is spending its resources decrying American organizations that are not blindly supportive of a foreign government it likes to align itself with.

If that's not fishy enough, what the ADL's list really showcases are the top ten most influential groups that have taken a principled anti-occupation and anti-displacement position and who call for a just peace. Why does that bother the ADL?
Here are a few thoughts on this list:

• The ADL is slowly but surely shifting its focus from fighting real bigotry to doing public relations work for the government of Israel, including shilling for its illegal occupation of Palestinian territories.
  
  
• The list includes many Jews including some who self-identify as friends of Israel, and yet the report still manages to accuse them of being anti-Israel and even anti-Semitic. This is because the ADL hopes it can convince you that anti-occupation is synonymous with anti-Israel and anti-Israel is synonymous with anti-Semitism.
  
  
• This latest stunt by the ADL comes on the heels of several other bizarre decisions, including the ADL's decision to side with far right-wing anti-religious freedom groups like the notorious SIOA (Stop the Islamization of America) against the proposed Islamic center near Ground Zero. So much for "fighting all forms of bigotry and defending democratic ideals and protecting civil rights for all." The ADL is now trying to backtrack from its position on this issue after a public backlash that seemed to take it by surprise.
  
  
• Since this list mostly targets organizations that have not been afraid to take a bold moral stance against the illegal Israeli occupation and other inhumane policies carried by the government of Israel against the occupied Palestinians, J Street ought to take a long hard look at itself and ask itself why it failed to make the list.
  
  
• Jewish Voice for Peace which proudly made the list wrote an excellent five point response to the ADL. If you were to contrast the morally expedient language of the ADL's report with the clarion values in the JVP's response, it is evident who represents the voice of extremism and who represents the voice of reason.
  
  
• Other "disturbingly" named organizations that accompany Jewish Voice for Peace include: Act Now to Stop War and End Racism, If Americans Knew, Students for Justice in Palestine, and US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation. Peace? No War? No Racism? Knowledge? Justice? No Occupation? Horrifying stuff.
  
  
• The list also includes mainstream U.S. Muslim organizations like CAIR. CAIR, like the other organizations on the list, is pro-peace and anti-injustice. CAIR's work centers on defending civil rights and dispelling misinformation and stereotypes about Muslims - doing for America's Muslims what the ADL used to do (and should be doing) for America's Jews. It does not concern itself with the political aspect of the conflict but with the legal, civil and human rights aspects that have repercussions on local constituents here and that are often supported by our tax dollars. CAIR's position has been one of opposition to the occupation and disenfranchisement of Palestinians. The ADL cannot point to one release from CAIR that can be described as bigoted against Israelis as a people, let alone against Jews. CAIR's releases and rallies have only addressed the occupation and the questionable actions of the government of Israel. But as I mentioned the ADL tries to equate opposition to the occupation and the illegal practices of the Likud government to bigotry and anti-Semitism in order to create a chilling effect.
  
  
• The ADL's report is announced on the front page of the ADL's website, right above its decision to honor Rupert Murdoch for his "stalwart support of Israel" (yet another mind-boggling moment from the ADL).  Why would the ADL who claims to "fight all forms of bigotry, defend democratic ideal and protects civil rights for all" turn around and award the man behind FOX News, a network that is notorious for spewing bigoted material and making a daily mockery of the news industry? Does the ADL really believe that FOX News "fights bigotry and promotes democratic ideals and equal civil rights for all"? Has Abe Foxman watched FOX News coverage of Muslims, Latinos, or immigrants lately? Why would the ADL offer Murdoch its "International leadership" award? Because the ADL's awardee selection committee is more concerned with where a candidate stands on Israel, even at the expense of where he stands on bigotry, democratic ideals, and equal civil rights - once again bringing to light the disturbing shift in the ADL's mission and raison d'etre.
  
  
• Lastly, the ADL's report takes issue with yours truly:
  

  In response to the Israeli Navy's raid of a flotilla of ships heading to Gaza in May 2010, the executive director of CAIR-Chicago accused Israel of a "failure to apply Jewish values"

  I am not sure what Abe Foxman's problem is with that? The Chicago Tribune piece that he is referring to was decidedly pro-Judaism. I received many thank you notes from Jewish friends and strangers including Rabbis. Given the gravity of the Israel violations at the time, many emailed to say that I was gracious and restrained.
  So why did Foxman take issue with this piece, you may ask? Well, because the piece was decidedly anti-occupation. Another exhibit for the ADL's changing priorities.
  
  
  
• I am not the only one calling out the ADL on its disgraceful switch in mission. Salon.com has some good coverage: Anti-Defamation League beclowns itself, again. As does the Daily Beast: The Anti-Defamation League has a new list out tarring human-rights activists in the name of protecting Israel. Michelle Goldberg on how the group is only disgracing itself.

A Jewish Group's Shameful Smear

A Jewish Group's Shameful Smear
by Michelle Goldberg
The Daily Beast
10/15/2010

The Anti-Defamation League has a new list out tarring human-rights activists in the name of protecting Israel. Michelle Goldberg on how the group is only disgracing itself.

The Anti-Defamation League, the premier American organization devoted to monitoring and combating anti-Semitism, has long had a dark side. No one has done better work investigating and exposing neo-Nazi and white Supremacist groups in the United States. I’ve spoken at several ADL meetings about my own reporting on Christian nationalism. But the ADL has also shown itself willing to smear human-rights activists when it thinks Israel’s interests demand it. It is in this context that the organization’s misguided new report on the “top 10 anti-Israel groups in America,” which includes Jewish Voice for Peace and the Council on American Islamic Relations, has to be understood.

In the 1980s, at a time when Israel maintained close ties with South Africa, the ADL went on the attack against Nelson Mandela’s African National Congress. As Sasha Polakow-Suransky reported in his recent book The Unspoken Alliance: Israel’s Secret Relationship with Apartheid South Africa, ADL National Director Nathan Perlmutter co-authored an article implying that the ANC was “totalitarian, anti-humane, anti-democratic, anti-Israel and anti-American.” The ADL sent spies into the American anti-apartheid movement, as well as other movements critical of right-wing American foreign policy. Eventually, the organization was surveilling much of the American left. In 1993, a California police raid on the offices of the ADL and one of its investigators yielded files on Greenpeace, the NAACP, Act Up, New Jewish Agenda, the Center for Investigative Reporting, and several Democratic politicians, among hundreds of others. The ADL eventually settled a class-action lawsuit brought by several of its targets...

The Council on American Islamic Relations made the list even though, according to spokesperson Ibrahim Hooper, it has no official position on the Middle East conflict “other than to say there should be a just and comprehensive resolution based on the interests of all parties.” Though the ADL says that CAIR has “a long record of anti-Israel rhetoric, which has, at times, crossed the line into anti-Semitism,” some of the examples it gives are laughable. For instance, the ADL informs us, “In response to the Israeli Navy's raid of a flotilla of ships heading to Gaza in May 2010, the executive director of CAIR-Chicago accused Israel of a ‘failure to apply Jewish values.’” If this is one of the worst quotes the ADL can rustle up, it gives one faith in the strength of American interfaith relations...

The ADL recognizes that it is losing the propaganda war. One reason it put out the list right now, Segal says, is that students are returning to campuses where there’s been an uptick in anti-Israel activism. “Online activism, as well as what’s happening on college campuses, are seeping into the younger generation,” he says.
But the reason young people’s views are changing isn’t because of sinister organizations. It’s because, given current Israeli policy, an unequivocal defense of the country requires ever more heroic feats of denial and rationalization. It requires great barrages of defamation, against Jimmy Carter, against once-revered South African jurist Richard Goldstone, against Desmond Tutu, against J-Street, the pro-Israel, pro-peace Washington group, and now, against groups like Jewish Voice for Peace. “This defense of Israel right or wrong makes them not have a moral compass,”


Read Full Article

The ADL Defames its Jewish Heritage

Kamran Pasha
August 1, 2010
The Huffington Post

...
The ADL, which was founded in 1913 as a powerful voice against religious discrimination in America, has over the past decade become increasingly xenophobic toward the Muslim community, which its leaders seem to view as a threat to Jews due to its lack of support for Israel. As a Christian friend who works in the Obama Administration lamented to me recently, the ADL has in essence become the "Pro-Defamation League" when it comes to Islam and Muslims.

The recent comments by Abraham Foxman, National Director of the ADL, against the proposed Muslim community center in New York are the latest in a long line of incidents where members of the ADL have promoted bigotry and discrimination against Arabs and Muslims. In 1993, the ADL illegally spied on American citizens who had spoken out in sympathy with Palestinians, generating a watch list of 10,000 names of private citizens and over 600 groups, and then selling the list to South African intelligence agents...

"Do not do unto others what you would not have others do unto you."

To Mr. Foxman and the rest of the ADL leadeship, I ask if in your hearts you would want people to accuse innocent Jews of being enemies of the state? Would you want Jews to accept vilification of their entire religion if a handful of Jews ever did something wrong? Would you want Jews to tacitly accept the lies that bigots had projected on to them? And finally, would you want Jews to be forced to shut down their synagogues because of the misguided passions of a mob?

Would you want this done to Jews?

If the answer is no, then I ask as your Muslim brother that you follow the wisdom of Rabbi Hillel and the sages of Judaism.

Do not do the same hateful thing to my people.

Stephen Prothero: How the Anti-Defamation League lost the moral high ground (CNN)

August 1, 2010
By Stephen Prothero, Special to CNN

You would think that most Jewish leaders in America would have a special sensitivity to the vitriol pouring out against Muslims concerning the proposed Islamic community center and mosque near ground zero.

You would think they would hear eerie echoes of 1930s Germany in the shouting down and silencing of an eleven-year-old girl at one of the hearings of the commission charged with determining whether the building in question deserved landmark status. You would think they would rush to the defense of a minority religion attacked for, among other things, conspiring to take over their country through the imposition of religious law.

If so, you would be wrong...

Read Full Article

I’m disappointed that the ADL has joined the demagogues

Cynthia Tucker
1:26 pm July 30, 2010

I am deeply disappointed by the Anti-Defamation League, a group which was founded to fight vicious bigotry and religious intolerance, specifically that against Jews.
The venerable organization has now made common cause with the bigots and demagogues who are fighting plans by a group of New York Muslims to build a community near (not at) Ground Zero. The ADL’s statement is careful in its wording, acknowledging that the Cordoba Initiative has the “right” to build near the site of the Twin Towers...

What is not right is for the ADL to join with those who smear all Muslims as somehow associated with suicidal jihadists. That’s the very definition of prejudice.
As a Christian, I want nothing to do with murders like Scott Roeder, who killed a Kansas abortion doctor and claimed he did it in God’s name. If anyone associated my Christianity with his, I’d be quite offended. But the ADL has joined with those who associate all Muslims with the 9/11 wackos...

Anti-Defamation League's opposition to ground zero mosque sparks debate

The Anti-Defamation League this week announced its opposition to a proposed mosque and community center at Ground Zero - a decision that is already provoking anger. On Friday, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) asked the ADL to retract its Wednesday statement:

"It is shocking that a group claiming to seek 'justice and fair treatment for all' would side with those engaged in one of the most egregious Islamophobic smear campaigns in recent memory," said CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad. "We ask the ADL to reconsider and retract this ill-considered and divisive statement. With its shameful statement, the ADL is exploiting and fueling the rising level of anti-Islam sentiment in our society."

...

Read Full Article

Boston Jewish community split on how to deal with anti-Muslim bigot

I am still waiting to read a statement from the ADL and the Museum of "Selective" Tolerance (MOT) denouncing the Nazi-style hate speech of Geert Wilders which was sponsored by Daniel Pipes' MEF and the Republican Jewish Coalition. Of course, I will not be holding my breath.

It is just very puzzling for me to witness how, of all people, a Jewish person can support or even accept this new form of Nazism, but this time against a new group: the Muslims. Aren't the horrific memories of the Holocaust and Auschwitz on their mind? May be the ADL and the MOT should sponsor free visits to the MOT for such people. You know what, I would love to contribute to such a project, especially if Pipes would go. May be he can learn something.

Fortunately, I hear from enough Jewish friends and activists denouncing such bigotry that I would never judge the whole Jewish community by the actions of the few hatemongers such as Pipes, Emerson, and others.

Such expressions of support for hate and racism makes me even more committed to continue challenging anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and all forms of racism.

----

Synagogue Hails Dutch Lawmaker as a Hero
Stoughton, Mass.
Penny Schwartz
JTA Wire Service
Jewish Telegraphic Agency

In his home continent, Dutch politician Geert Wilders is something of a pariah, banned from the United Kingdom and facing prosecution in the Netherlands for his harsh views of Islam.

His calls to end immigration from Muslim countries and ban the Koran—he compared it to Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” and said it incites to violence—have earned him broad condemnation in Europe and forced him under the protection of a security detail, a rarity for Dutch leaders.

But in some quarters of the American Jewish community, Wilders is more akin to a hero. At the very least, he was greeted as such by about 250 people last week at a Conservative synagogue in this Boston-area town.

The boisterous crowd at the Ahavath Torah Congregation gave Wilders, who heads the Dutch Party for Freedom and serves in the parliament, a standing ovation and shouted “Bravo” at the conclusion of his speech.

In an event co-sponsored by the Middle East Forum’s Legal Project and the Republican Jewish Coalition, Wilders made his only synagogue appearance on his recent tour of the United States, where he appeared on cable news networks and radio talk shows, spoke at the National Press Club and held a private showing of his anti-radical Islam film “Fitna” for senators and their staff on Capitol Hill...

“If our collective voice is impeded from speaking” or “shut down,” said [Daniel] Pipes, then “the way is paved for radical Islam to move ahead.”...

Republican Jewish Coalition executive director Matt Brooks takes a similar position, saying that while he also opposes banning the Koran, he believes Wilders’ views should still be given a hearing...

Bjorn Larsen, whose International Free Press Society arranged Wilders’ U.S. tour, said the Dutch politician was invited personally by the rabbi at Ahavath Torah, Jonathan Hausman...

There were no protests at Wilders’ speech—there was little advance publicity—and many in the crowd were sympathetic to his arguments. Andrew Warren of Sharon said he wanted to judge for himself whether Wilders is xenophobic, and said afterwards that Wilders had not crossed the line.

“The unfortunate reality is that a lot of troubling passages in the Koran are being embraced by militant ideology,” Warren said.

Louise Cohen of Brookline described Wilders as a hero and a man of courage...

While unaware of Wilders’ call to ban the Koran, Cohen said his film makes a case that the Koran is a hate document.

That view troubles Ron Newman, who said Wilders took certain verses from the Koran that appeared to promote violence and used them to generalize about all of Islam.

Saying that a similar approach could be used with portions of the Torah, Newman cautioned that the line of reasoning could be used to produce an anti-Semitic film.

“I don’t like that being done to us,” he said. “I don’t support people who do that to others.”

Dissenting at your own risk

Dissenting at your own risk
By CECILIE SURASKY
Special to the Star-Telegram

Last year, I agreed to speak to a Jewish youth group about my organization, Jewish Voice for Peace, and our opposition to Israel's occupation. My talk was to follow one from a member of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which calls itself "America's pro-Israel Lobby."

A week before, a shaken program leader said the AIPAC staffer had threatened to get the entire youth program's funding canceled if I was allowed in the door. The threat worked, and in disgust, they canceled the whole talk.

Pundits will surely argue for years about professors Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer's explosive new book, The Israel Lobby, which blames poor U.S. policy in the Middle East on a loose network of individuals and pro-Israel advocacy groups.

But the book, and the response to it, opens up another controversy: the stifling of debate about unconditional U.S. support for Israeli policies.

Why is Israel's increasingly brutal 40-year occupation of Palestinian land regularly debated in the mainstream media abroad, including in Israel, but not here? And why is there an almost total lack of discussion among presidential candidates about the dollars that subsidize this occupation and the American diplomatic support that makes it possible?

In a society built on the free exchange of ideas, as Walt and Mearsheimer point out, one answer can be found by looking at the many self-appointed gatekeepers, such as Abraham Foxman and the Anti-Defamation League, or Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz, who use their Jewish identity as both a shield and cudgel. They work diligently to silence those who question ill-conceived policies of the Israeli and U.S. governments.

Non-Jewish critics, even former President Carter, are denounced as anti-Semites. Special ire is reserved for Jewish dissenters, who are branded as "self-hating" or "marginal," while Muslim and Arab-Americans are easily smeared and even criminalized with charges of supporting terrorism.

Stunned by the stifling of dissent, we decided to start a Web site, Muzzlewatch, to track the incidents. Just as we launched, Stanford Middle East Studies Professor Joel Beinin was disinvited from a speaking engagement at a high school with just 24 hours' notice.

After an unprecedented campaign of outside interference waged by Dershowitz, Professor Norman Finkelstein was refused tenure by DePaul University because of his criticism of U.S.-Israeli policy.

Palestinian-American anthropologist Nadia Abu El-Haj is fighting a political campaign to deny her tenure at Barnard.

Even Walt and Mearsheimer, who are getting plenty of exposure, couldn't have asked for better proof of their point that the lobby works to stifle dissent when an embarrassed head of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs told them that their scheduled speech was canceled. (They did speak before the World Affairs Council of Dallas/Fort Worth on Sept. 17.) This was apparently because Foxman was not available that day to "balance" their talk.

(They had initially been booked by themselves. The talk was not rescheduled.)

Many groups that started with the important work of fighting real anti-Semitism now rely on anti-Semitism to insist that to show one's love of Jews, one must offer uncritical support to Israel. They are especially displeased by Jews who believe that enabling Israeli violations of Palestinian human rights is not good for anyone.

Unless this atmosphere of intimidation is confronted, Americans will continue to lack access to information and perspectives necessary to formulate effective Middle East policies, virtually ensuring that Israel and the United States will be at war for many years to come.


'The Israel Lobby'
A podcast of Walt and Mearsheimer's presentation is available at http://podcast.dfwworld.org/2007_09-17_The_Israel_Lobby.MP3

Cecilie Surasky is communications director for the Oakland-based Jewish Voice for Peace.

Ayloush comments on ADL's smear tactics

CAIR slams ADL for ‘smear tactics’
By InFocus Staff
http://www.infocusnews.net/content/view/16398/135/

LOS ANGELES, Calif. – In an open letter addressed to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), a leading Jewish advocacy group, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a national Islamic civil rights and advocacy group accused the ADL of contributing to growing Islamophobia in American society by using “smears and exclusionary tactics” in its latest attack on the due process of a group of American Muslims.


According to CAIR, those smears appeared in a recent ADL news release targeting members of a coalition defending the legal rights of officials of the Holy Land Foundation (HLF) Muslim charity currently on trial in Texas.

Abrahim Foxman, director of ADL.

CAIR alleged the ADL falsely claimed in its release that members of the coalition ave been “tainted by their own murky associations with radical organizations and individuals.”

CAIR officials denounced the accusations.

“It is regrettable that the Anti-Defamation League, which claims to defend American civil liberties, would seek to exploit the growing level of Islamophobia in our society by using the same smears and exclusionary tactics that have in the past been used by anti-Semites to target the Jewish Community,” Ibrahim Hooper, communications director of CAIR National, told InFocus.

In its Aug. 21, 2007, press release, ADL stated, “If CAIR truly repudiates acts of terror and murder, we would welcome a simple declaratory statement that no cause, no matter how just it may be, justifies the use of suicide killers, rockets or other means to target civilians.”

Hooper accused the ADL of attempting to muzzle the First Amendment rights of American Muslims by smearing and demonizing them. Ibrahim Hooper, communications director CAIR National.

In its Aug. 29, 2007, open letter responding to the ADL’s release, CAIR’s National Chairman Parvez Ahmed and National Executive Director Nihad Awad wrote:
“A little research would have revealed a CAIR-coordinated 2005 fatwa, or Islamic juristic opinion, that states in part: ‘All acts of terrorism targeting civilians are haram (forbidden) in Islam. It is haram [forbidden] for a Muslim to cooperate with any individual or group that is involved in any act of terrorism or violence. It is the civic and religious duty of Muslims to cooperate with law enforcement authorities to protect the lives of all civilians.’
“Also, our 2004 ‘Not in the Name of Islam’ online petition states: ‘No injustice done to Muslims can ever justify the massacre of innocent people, and no act of terror will ever serve the cause of Islam.’”

Hooper also accused the ADL of being “shamefully hypocritical” on the issue of terrorism.

“CAIR and other American Muslim organizations have consistently condemned terrorism, including attacks on Israeli civilians,” he said, pointing out that “the ADL has remained silent about the abuses suffered by the Palestinian people under occupation.”

Hooper also said CAIR has repeatedly called for a peaceful and just resolution to the Middle East conflict that took into account the rights and responsibilities of all parties.

“For too long, the ADL has allowed its blind support for Israel’s brutal policies toward the Palestinians and its zero-sum approach to public debate on the Middle East conflict to unnecessarily poison relations between the Jewish and American Muslim communities,” he said.

The ADL denied the charges, and said the organization supported the civil rights of all in this country, including Muslims.

But CAIR’s open letter also outlined the ADL’s record of anti-Muslim and anti-civil rights behavior during the course of the past 10 years, including a 1999 monetary settlement of 1993 lawsuit that accused the ADL of spying on the Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee and anti-Apartheid groups.

“The ADL has a history of seeking to marginalize and disenfranchise American Muslims in an attempt to stifle an alternative viewpoint on U.S. policy in the Middle East,” the open letter stated.

An example of that, according to the letter, was a 2004 incident when the ADL was forced to issue an apology for remarks in another news release that seemed to link the Islamic declaration of faith, or ‘shahada,’ with terrorism.

That news release, distributed by the ADL’s Orange County/Long Beach Regional Office, referred to the shahada as an ”expression of hate” that is ‘closely identified’ with terrorism and is ‘offensive to Jewish students.’

The ADL’s press release added that CAIR can “never be fully accepted in the Jewish community” until it condemns groups which aim to kill Jews and destroy Israel.

Hussam Ayloush, executive director of CAIR’s Greater Los Angeles Area office responded that “neither CAIR nor any American Muslim organization needed the ADL’s blessings to be accepted by the Jewish community.”
Ayloush added, “CAIR is proud of its work and associations with many in the Jewish community and with many American Jewish organizations. As for ADL and other extremist groups, we are glad not to be accepted by those who do not respect our religion or our community.”

The CAIR open letter quoted Shalom Center Director Rabbi Arthur Waskow (described by the Jewish Forward as one of the 50 most influential American Jews today) who wrote, after speaking a CAIR dinner: “Far from showing irreparable conflict between the Jewish community and CAIR, in fact the dinner showed that a seriously peace-committed part of the Jewish community can work with a seriously peace-committed part of the Muslim community, despite the existence of some violence-supportive people in both communities. That is the truthful and the important story.”

The open letter also quoted Rabbi Jeff Sultar of Mishkan Shalom in Pennsylvania who said: “We are inspired by the interfaith work that CAIR does, which serves to make all communities of faith stronger, and helps to address a serious gap in the understanding of Islam in the United States.”

Other American Muslim leaders expressed disappointment with ADL’s attempts to defame and marginalize the American Muslim community.

In an interview with InFocus, Shaikh Yassir Fazaga, Imam of the Orange County Islamic Foundation in Mission Viejo, Calif., and a prominent national Muslim leader, expressed hope that, considering the history of abuse faced by the Jewish community in Europe, this community will be alert not to allow any group to falsely use its name to victimize Muslims or others.

“The Muslim community has long realized that the Jewish community is not ADL and the ADL is not the Jewish community,” he said. “Over the years, we have managed to build friendships and cooperation with many in the Jewish community without having to go through ADL.”

“ADL seems focused on foreign issues, mainly Israel and its image. Local Muslims and Jews realize that we need not agree on foreign policy matters, but we can still cooperate on the many issues of common concern,” he added.

“Muslims get their inspiration from both the golden age of Islam and Judaism, in Andalusia, when both groups were tolerant of each other. This is what we long for now, but the current behavior of groups like ADL makes things like these unattainable,” Fazaga concluded.

CAIR representatives, however, opened the door for dialogue.

“If the ADL stops promoting noted Islamophobes and affirms the right of Americans to criticize the policies of any foreign country, including but not limited to Israel, without being demonized, then CAIR will welcome any opportunity to enter into dialogue,” stated the open letter.

CAIR leaders told InFocus that with the onset of the holy seasons of Ramadan and Tisheri, American Muslims and Jews should work together and engage in dialogue for peace and justice around the world.