Are American Muslims Worthy of Congressional Investigations?

Yesterday I reported that a gathering of radical Republicans plan to host hearings investigating Muslims spies in Congress. Their evidence? A document from the Council of American Islamic Relations (CAIR) that calls for placing Muslim interns in Congressional offices to “focus on influencing congressmen responsible for policy that directly impacts the American Muslim community,” as the document states. In other words: doing what every other interest group does. All interest groups seek to place staff in Congressional offices so they have an “in” and can more effectively influence policy. If anything, the Muslims are grossly underplaying considering that interns have no influence. And you best be sure that the Israel lobby seeks to place staff.

Well, more hearings to come. The next Congress may be the most vile since the McCarthy era. And notice that Democrats will do nothing to criticize such hearings:

The Republican who will head the House committee that oversees domestic security is planning to open a Congressional inquiry into what he calls “the radicalization” of the Muslim community when his party takes over the House next year.

Representative Peter T. King of New York, who will become the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said he was responding to what he has described as frequent concerns raised by law enforcement officials that Muslim leaders have been uncooperative in terror investigations.

Told of Mr. King’s plan, Muslim leaders expressed strong opposition, describing the move as a prejudiced act that was akin to racial profiling and that would unfairly cast suspicion on an entire group.

Abed A. Ayoub, the legal director for the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, said Mr. King’s effort ignored that Muslim leaders around the country had been working closely with law enforcement officials since the 2001 terror attacks.

“We are disturbed that this representative who is in a leadership position does not have the understanding and knowledge of what the realities are on the ground,” Mr. Ayoub said, adding that Mr. King’s proposal “has bigoted intentions.”

But Mr. King suggested that Muslim leaders had minimized the extent of the problem he said he had identified. “They try to tell me that it is not as bad as it seems,” he said.

Rep. King is a noted paranoid zealot and bigot against Muslims, once remarking that too many mosques exist in America (he later amended his words). His hostility grows more and more pronounced against Muslims every year, but he never questions the foreign policy that breeds terrorism.

And his claim that Muslims are uncooperative is bunk. Muslims organizations only withdrew some measure of cooperation when the F.B.I. resorted to sordid tactics like spying, warrant-less wiretapping, and even entrapment against Muslims. Muslims are patriotic like all other Americans and do turn in authentic suspicions, but they will not be degraded and submit to a relationship where they are treated as guilty into proven innocent. That's not how America is supposed to work. Muslims still cooperate despite such tactics (read this story as an illustration of the obscene F.B.I. efforts and cases), but it is no surprise that many feel alineted and withdrew their initial cooperation.

And, yes, the whole "homegrown terrorism" business is overstated, greatly so. It is a handful, no more, of people who suffer some isolation and many of these cases were not terrorism cases until the F.B.I. found some hopeless chap and set him up and then ran a headline about how they "caught" some terrorist which they themselves planted. Entrapment is wrong and unbecoming in a free society, breeds mistrust between the F.B.I. and the Muslims community, and incites suspicions of Muslims. How else do you want the community to respond after such acts? But, in any case, even with the F.B.I.'s heartfelt effort to create terrorists so it can cite "successes" it is still a fringe matter entirely disconnected from mainstream Muslim life.

And, lastly, did the U.S. Congress ever hold hearings over the "radicalization" in the Jewish community, especially when the Jewish Defense League and other Jewish extremist groups were committing terrorist acts against Arab-Americans and the Soviet offices, including travel firms, in America (the latter because the Soviets did not allow Jews to immigrate to Israel) and when the JDL was listed by the F.B.I. as the number one domestic terrorist organization and polls showed that 15% of American-Jews still supported the JDL and ideology of the late Rabbi Meir Kahane? Or what about "radicalization" in the African-American community in the case of, say, the Black Panthers or Nation of Islam? Muslims are a minor minority when it comes to domestic terrorism according to the same law enforcement officials that King consulates with:

piechart SVrmN 19672

Terrorist Attacks on U.S. Soil by Group From 1980 to 2005 According to FBI Database. (H/T: LoonWatch).

So cousin Issac is a more prodigious threat than the constantly picked on Ishmael.

But the question of the threat against whom and who is doing the deeds often politicizes and influences whether some acts and terrorists receive ample attention or some are downplayed for political purposes. And the reason we hear about "Muslim terrorists" and so little about the far more frequent other is due to political and hateful expediency by anti-Islam bigots, the Christian Right and Zionists.

Or, finally, why doesn't he investigate himself? Ever since his election to Congress, the Irish Catholic King has been a strident supporter of the IRA - a State Department listed terrorist organization. Or are the IRA just the "good terrorists"?

But only Muslims are easy prey for the radical right.