Every time you hear the word, Islamofauxbia, just imagine a mythical unicorn bleating it.
Berkeley Prof: Terrorists Good, ‘Islamophobia’ Bad
by Cinnamon Stillwell and Rima Greene
FrontPage Magazine
May 9, 2014
When “interfaith dialogue,” “Islamophobia,” boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS), and academia collide, there’s a good chance that Friends of Sabeel – North America (FOSNA) will be involved. Case in point: FOSNA, the “voice of the Palestinian Christians,” recently held a conference with the title, “Voices for Justice & Peace in the Holy Land” that encompassed all four factors. It took place at co-host Christ the King Catholic Church in Pleasant Hill, California, a massive complex with plenty of room for the workshops that made up the bulk of the conference. Tables displayed with anti-Israel books, leaflets, flyers, and T-shirts lined the walls of the cafeteria; approximately 100 people attended, many sporting keffiyehs, including a tall woman wearing a patchwork-style dress composed entirely of the scarves. Radical chic was all the rage.
Keffiyeh dress |
Hatem Bazian—a senior lecturer in the department of Near Eastern studies, director of the Islamophobia Research & Documentation Project at the University of California, Berkeley, and a regular at Sabeel conferences and other “interfaith” events—led the workshop titled “American Muslims and the Palestinian struggle for liberation.” It focused on the alleged connection between “Islamophobia,” counterterrorism, and the pro-Israel movement.
After devoting much of his talk to defending Islamist individuals and organizations indicted in terrorism cases, Bazian went a step further by pledging the financial and legal assistance of the group for which he is co-founder and chairman, American Muslims for Palestine (AMP), a conference co-sponsor:
We have a total of 4,300 cases; ninety percent are Palestinian [and] regarding ‘material support for terrorism.’ . . . Right now we are in the middle of planning another appeal on the Holy Land Foundation case, which already has cost us $5 million.
However, AMP does not officially engage in legal advocacy, but, rather, “educational” efforts, rendering Bazian’s claims, particularly the inflated figure of “4,300 cases,” suspect. Bazian sits on the board of directors of the Muslim Legal Fund of America (MLFA), which filed a motion to vacate the prison sentences of the five Holy Land Foundation defendants in late 2013. He may have had this in mind when he made the above statement, but his numbers still don’t add up, as MLFA lists only 48 cases wherein they are involved. Bazian should either verify the existence of the alleged 4,300 cases or to stop repeating this falsehood to the public.
More here. H/T: Fjordman
