WASHINGTON SCENE:
IT'S "TAKE A MUSLIM TO LUNCH" TIME
MER - WASHINGTON - 27 June:
Attorney General Janet Reno spoke at the Arab-American
Anti-Discrimination
Committee Washington conference a few weeks ago. FBI Director Louis
Freeh spoke to the American Muslim Council on Friday. And William Clinton, President of
the USA, spoke to the Arab American Institute (that's Zogby and Company) last month.
None of these organizational gatherings actually represents
significant membership or influence around the country. The only group among these that
even has a grass-roots following is ADC, and it is extremely weak politically and very
badly lead. Incidentally, though not purposefully Muslim in orientation, ADC did have
Muslim prayers on the official program this year, led by none other than the AMC's Founder
Abdulrahman Alamoudi. Indeed, most of these Washington- based Arab and Muslim groups
represent political incest at its worst; constantly praising and handing out awards to
each other. And just like biological incest such conditions lead to, and perpetuate, major
weaknesses and deformities.
And none of these speeches by senior U.S. Government officials had
any particular content to them or any particular domestic political significance. In each
case the Washington politicians were using the organizations that invited them far more
than being used themselves. Such photo ops are important these days, projecting an image
of American "fairness" and "even-handedness" when in fact nothing of
the kind is actually taking place.
The overall reality is that the U.S., Israel, and client
Arab-regimes are all very much in bed with each other these days; a reality significantly
enhanced since the Gulf War and the Madrid-Oslo "Peace Process" that followed in
its wake. It's a very self-serving alliance meant to retain American domination of the
crucial Middle East region while allowing Israeli sub-control, both militarily and
economically. Those regimes and organizations willing to cooperate and do what they are
told are welcomed and rewarded; everyone else is disregarded or pushed under.
With the AMC still meeting this weekend at the Hilton Hotel near
National Airport, these previously published "Washington Scene" articles that
follow -- and which we promised to reprint in June because of the stepped up attempts by
some of the "client organizations" to censor and slander MER -- take on added
significance:
Washington Scene: 26 May
MUSLIM STUDENT ASSOCIATION (MSA) CENSORS MER
KING FAHD "YES", MER "NO"
"Amazingly, MSANEWS is now circulating to American Muslims
Press Releases from King Fahd in Saudi Arabia while censoring MER articles about what's
really going on!"
The real losers are the Muslims themselves all around the USA who in
the end are deprived of the real information they need -- especially about their own
organizations and what is really going on in Washington. Information is power; and lack of
honest, forthright, difficult to obtain information is one of the reasons the Muslims
collectively remain so weak and practically helpless in the USA.
Apparently MER is increasingly doing its job well -- for this job
cannot be done properly without coming up against those who try to manipulate and mislead
through every means everyone involved with the Middle East, including controlling what
information they easily have access to.
The Muslim Student Association News (MSANEWS) is portrayed as a
mechanism to inform concerned Muslims about politics and the Middle East via the Internet.
But increasingly MSANEWS has become a kind of propagandistic bulletin board service for
Muslim and Arab American organizations sending out misleading and self-serving press
releases, with heavy manipulation from those association with Jim Zogby and the
"Arab-American Institute" (AAI) and the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination
Committee (ADC).
Indeed, after repeated assurances from MSANEWS that censorship would
not be taking place, those monitoring MSANEWS for MER discovered that key articles in the
past few months dealing with "The Washington Scene" (including articles
mentioning what is really going on behind the scenes regarding ADC and AAI and the
"Peace Process") have been censored by MSANEWS. Amazingly, MSANEWS is now
circulating Press Releases from King Fahd in Saudi Arabia to American Muslims while
censoring MER about what's really going on both in the Middle East and in Washington!
Washington Scene - Muslim Organizations (29 May):
MUSLIM ORGANIZATIONS IN USA --
CO-OPTED, LEADERLESS, OVER THEIR HEADS
"I came to the conclusion many years ago that Arafat, Hussein,
Fahd, Mubarak and other leaders are not totally responsible for our problems. The majority
of sheikhs, imams and other Muslim 'leaders' are actually the reason for Arab and Muslim
problems."
- Ali Baghdadi
Publisher, Arab Journal (5/27/98)
Muslim organizations in the USA use to be centered around the local
mosques and dealing primarily with social and religious issues in their communities. But
for a variety of reasons -- including the rise of Muslim movements in the Middle East and
the failure of secular Arab institutions both in the region as well as in the USA -- in
recent years a number of Muslim organizations have set up shop in Washington and Muslim
students have become active on the internet.
In the Washington community itself, the Saudis working in tandem
with other Arab countries, long ago took over the local Washington mosque, quickly ending
its useful, but threatening, independent existence. Still to this day more than 15 years
later, those who were thrown out of the Mosque, included the only elected Imam, Mohamed
al-Asi, can be seen praying on Fridays on the sidewalk across the street from the Mosque
on Massachusetts Avenue. It was a battle of integrity and independence against the Arab
"client regimes"; and corruption, money, and the power they bring prevailed as
is increasingly the case in contemporary Washington.
As for the "Muslim" organizations that have been expanding
their presence in Washington in recent years, the following is a short summary:
AMC - American Muslim Council: By far the most co-opted of the new
organizations, AMC's upcoming conference in Washington next month could have been approved
at the Saudi Embassy (it probably was!). None other than "Uncle Jim" -- Jim
Zogby of the "Arab-American Institute" (AAI) -- is working closely with AMC
these days. Zogby is trying desperately to infiltrate and control the American Muslim
community just as he has done with some success to the Arab-American community -- all on
behalf of the Arab "client regimes" and some say the American intelligence
community. In short, the close alliance between former Ex. Dir. Abdurahman Alamoudi who
set up AMC, and Zogby, has fatally flawed AMC making it a "client organization"
that should be shunned, not attended.
MPAC - Muslim Public Affairs Council: MPAC is primarily the
outgrowth of wealthy establishment Arab-Americans in California who have never shown much
political sophistication or courage, and who always trail behind coming forward only when
it becomes clear what is politically correct at the moment. MPAC now has a small
Washington office but is nearly totally subsumed in the American capital by the other
groups. Bottom Line: MPAC is always far too little, far too late, much too self-serving --
and that's by purposeful design, the well-healed California crowd always waiting to see
which way the wind is blowing, what is in it for them, and what government official they
can next get their picture taken with as an excuse to visit Washington one more time to
hobnob with the powerful.
CAIR - Council on American-Islamic Relations: Not nearly as co-opted
as AMC, but at a heavy price. CAIR is nearly always outflanked by AMC and left to handle
matters that are relatively easy, not very controversial, and not very big-league
political -- i.e., not very important. CAIR does have something of a grassroots following,
unlike the other groups which are top-heavy in the extreme; but caters to internal and
local concerns rather than to the big really important matters of the day. Executive
Director Nihad Awad may mean well as many say; but he's outgunned and outclassed at
practically every turn that matters.
MSANEWS - Muslim Student Association News (on the Internet): Many
Muslim students around the country have become affiliated with MSA and many are
well-meaning and dedicated. It's just that they are badly lead, oftentimes exceedingly
naive, far too often informationally misguided, and usually politically lost in the woods.
As for MSANEWS, though the product of considerable hard work, in short it has become an
effort way, WAY, over its head politically while more and more co-opted and manipulated by
others, including the very same organizations and personalities who have so infected and
corrupted the secular Arab organizations, and ironically, by a few of the disguised
Zionist organizations as well. Moreover, MSANEWS is terribly hamstrung by its own internal
divisions and contradictions, contributing little original information, providing no
leadership, but taking the easy way out by having learned to hit the resend button.
UASR - United Association for Studies and Research. Headquartered in
a small office building in the Virginia suburbs this little organization, usually thought
of as affiliated informally with Hamas and related organizations, desperately tries to put
out a few publications, hold a few meetings, and sends it representatives, primarily Ahmed
Yusef, around Washington to lunch with others. It was this organization that deported to
Jordan Hamas Leader Musa Abu Marzook was affiliated with. Overall UASR is insignificant on
the Washington scene though what some of those associated with it might be doing behind
the scenes is hard to fathom.
