GotZoom
Senior Member
Long article I know. It provides many facts that show the ties between this "award winner" and terrorism.
Guess this Democratic Senator doesn't feel this is a problem.
In fact, the entire Democratic party must be OK with it.
Why does that not surprise me.
--------
A Moroccan Islamist and apparent terrorism supporter has been getting treatment in Washington D.C. that most graduate students can only dream of. Mustafa Khalfi, editor-in-chief of the Moroccan newspaper At-Tajdid (Renewal), is the recipient of a prestigious Fulbright/American Political Science Association (APSA) Congressional Fellowship. This honor has afforded him the honor of working for Congressman Jim McDermott (D-WA), taking a course at Johns Hopkins University, and receiving a visiting scholarship at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
At-Tajdids connection to terrorism:
At-Tajdids website has a permanent link to the Union of Good, an umbrella organization of Hamas-funding charities. Five of these organizations have been listed by the U.S. Treasury Department as Specially Designated Global Terrorist entities (SDGTs):
* The Al-Aqsa Foundation, Belgium and Holland Branches
* Interpal
* Comité de Benfaisance et de Secours aux Palestiniens (CBSP)
* Sanabil al-Aqsa
* The Palestinian Relief Society, Switzerland
In addition, two more groups, The World Association of Muslim Youth (WAMY), and the International Islamic Relief Organization (IIRO), have been accused in a lawsuit filed by families of the 9/11 victims[1] of being connected to Osama bin Laden and two of his top operatives.
The Union of Good was established in October 2000 and is presided over by Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi and run by Essam Yussuf, a prominent figure in Interpal, a British Hamas front organization. Even the Palestinian Authority considers the Union of Good as a body supporting Hamas.
Clicking on the link to the Union of Good on the At-Tajdid website gives the reader a choice of English or Arabic. The English site takes the reader to the donations page of Interpal, a British-based charity that is designated by the U.S. as an SDGT. According to U.S. law, this is an indication that Khalfi himself should be designated a SGDT. A check of archived At-Tajdid websites shows this link to be a permanent feature since at least February 2003.
In August 2003, when the U.S. Treasury Department designated Interpal and several other Union of Good charities as SDGTs, it determined that they provide support to Hamas and form part of its funding network in Europe. In other words, Mustapha Khalfi is the editor of a newspaper that knowingly solicited funds for a SDGT.
Executive order 13224 is very clear about the criteria that the Secretary of the Treasury may use to designate an entity as a SDGT. Anyone determined to act for or on behalf of a listed entity or to provide financial support for, or financial services to or in support of entities designated in or under the Order or [t]o be otherwise associated with certain individuals or entities designated in or under the Order may be designated a SDGT. In other words, soliciting funds or even being associated with an SDGT is enough to get someone designated an SDGT.
Given the facts, it strains credulity to assert that Khalfi did not knowingly support funding Interpal or that he was not associated with the Union of Good. There is at least a prima facie case to designate Khalfi as a SDGT. The only possible recourse for a defender of Khalfi is try to exonerate him on a technicality. Khalfi certainly violated the spirit of executive order 13224 if not the letter, and the U.S. Treasury department is currently reviewing a dossier of our findings.
Also, At Tajdid is the official paper of an association called Al Islah Wa Attawhid, also known by its French acronym MUR (Mouvement de lUnicité et de la Réforme) which is closely linked to the same SDGTs. The MUR is a constituent organization of the Union of Good, which we described above. In addition, Dr. Abd Ziyad Al-Mughrabi al-Idrisi, who sits on the consultative council of the MUR and the secretariat of the PJD (Parti de la Justice et du Dévelopement), the main Moroccan Islamist party, is also a trustee of the Union of Good.
At-Tajdid and the MUR Islamist propaganda
At-Tajdid was among the first papers in the world to explain last year's horrific tsunami by pointing out that the affected Asian countries were corrupt and that the tsunami was a punishment from God. Later in the piece, At-Tajdid implied that the same punishment might be in the works for Morocco because of the lack of respect Moroccan society shows Islam. When pressed about this line of analysis, Khalfi answered, "Regarding the tsunami, only God knows the truth."
A Palestinian journalist, who often writes for At-Tajdid, declared that Hurricane Katrina was a "gift from Heaven." He added, "If the neocons were to see your enthusiasm and determination, they would realize that they will never win against our Ummah."
After Hamas victory in the Palestinians elections on January 25, At Tajdid wrote: The victory of Hamas is the result of Gods will and "is the beginning of the Palestinian peoples salvation.
The noted researcher and Islamogist Said Elakhal explained to the daily Aujourdhui Le Maroc that Hamas and the PJD have the exact same ideology. This should not come as a surprise since they both are branches of the Muslim Brotherhood.
The MUR website is hosting a whos who of extremists. It displays permanent links to:
· Yusuf Qaradawis website. Qaradawi has been called the spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood,[2] and has issued fatwas supporting suicide bombings, wife-beating, and calls for the Muslim conquest of Europe.
· www.Islamonline.net which publishes Qaradawis fatwas.
· www.daawa.net: Apparently a site of the Muslim Brotherhood, with a picture of brotherhood founder Hassan al-Banna displayed on every page.
· www.islamweb.net, which contains a presentation praising Hamas founder Ahmed Yassin.
Recently, the MUR website published a statement calling for a world day of protest of the Danish Mohammed cartoons. Significantly, the statement had a list of signatories, or supporters including:
o Five individuals openly identified as Muslim Brotherhood leaders
o Khaled Mashal of Hamas
o Mohammed al-Hamadawi, president of the MUR
o Saadine Othmani, general secretary of the PJD, who will visit Washington next month to meet US Congressmen.
Indeed, both the MUR and At-Tajdid websites recently displayed prominent links to the website of Yassin Day, an internet site dedicated to the loving memory of the work of Hamas founder Ahmed Yassin.
At Tajdid and the Zionists
The MUR website is replete with statements referring to the Zionist entity, glorious Hamas, and complaints about laws prohibiting Holocaust denial.
As the mouthpiece of a Hamas-supporting Islamist group, At-Tajdid takes a hard line against Jews. For instance, on December 15, 2004 Khalfi wrote an editorial entitled "The Israeli blackmail on France is still going on strong" on the French decision to ban Al Manar, i.e. Hezbollah TV, just recently designated a SDGT by U.S. Treasury thanks to the hard work of the Foundation of the Defense of Democracies.
Here is a chosen excerpt:
This decision is a sign of the increasing influence of the Zionist lobby in French domestic policy, as well as an increased French submission to Israeli pressure. This occurred while at the same time France adopts a more balanced foreign policy towards the Arab and Muslim world.(...)
France has been taken hostage by the Zionist lobby. The same can be said of the American democracy, hostage of the Christian far right working for Zionist interests. As De Gaulle did when he started the war of liberation of France, the free French must wonder whether it is not time to undertake a similar battle to liberate France from the Zionist blackmail, this new form of Nazism.
( ) This lobby exerts all kinds of pressure and blackmail on Frances political, cultural and media decision-making centers. Let me remind you for instance the defamation campaign conducted against the French intellectual Roger Garaudy, who had revealed the reality of the founding myths of Zionism.
We note that Garaudy is a French convert to Islam who is one of the most notorious Holocaust deniers in the world.
At Tajdid also usually speaks of the "Zionist entity" or puts the word Israel in scare quotes, indicating that it does not accept Israel's legitimacy as a nation. After the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, At-Tajdid's editorial read:
"Congratulations to the Palestinian resistance for this great victory which announces an even greater victory that of the recovery of Al Quds and all stolen Palestinian territories." In light of this one should not be surprised that At-Tajdid and Khalfi were opposed to any kind of peace process in the between the Israelis and the Palestinians--and even the normalization of relations between Morocco and Israel. In 1999, during a period of relative quiet between Israelis and Palestinians, the Egyptian daily Al-Ahram ran an article quoting Khalfi: Mustafa Khalfi, a writer who opposes Arab-Israeli normalization, criticizes this group's (Moroccan Jews) economic power because it "aims to influence decision-making [in Morocco]. As another example, during the recent Danish cartoon controversy, At Tajdid blamed a Zionist provocation aimed at reviving the conflict between the West and the Muslim nation.
The March 14, 2006 edition reproduces verbatim an entry published on The Al-Aqsa Organization website claiming that Israeli President Moshe Katsav declared war against the Al-Aqsa mosque.
At Tajdid and terrorism
On May 16, 2005, the second anniversary of the 2003 terror attacks on Western and Jewish targets in Casablanca, the whole of the Moroccan press--except At-Tajdid--commemorated the day. Instead, At-Tajdid went as far as to claim that the attacks were "a conspiracy against the Islamist movement." At-Tajdid has even expressed doubts about the existence of the Salafiya Jihadia, one of the main terrorist organizations behind the 2003 bombings in Morocco, referring to the group cryptically as "what some call the Salafiya Jihadia."
Mohamed Brini, the editor of the daily Al Ahdath Al Maghribia and an expert on At-Tajdid, says that At-Tajdid has never fully condemned a terrorist act, and instead often attempts to downplay terrorist incidents while making excuses for the perpetrators.
In fact, after the May 2003 terrorist attacks, there was a large consensus to ban the PJD, including Moroccos king Mohammed VI, but the US through its Ambassador pressured him successfully to give up this idea.
At Tajdid and the USA
Mustafa Khalfi isn't wild about the United States, either. After President Bush's reelection, in an editorial dated November 5, 2004, Khalfi wrote that the Arab and Muslim world was in for another four years of instability, insecurity, and increasing dominance of the "Zionist Right." He added: "The Arab and Islamic world must prepare for a very difficult stage which demands the strengthening of a common action and the reconciliation between the regimes and their peoples."
After the assassination of Lebanon's Rafiq Al Hariri, Khalfi saw another conspiracy in America's "arrogant colonial project." He wrote:
Despite the difficulty of identifying those who were behind the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, reactions have demonstrated that the assassination is part of a project that began with the mapping out of Iraqi election results, with the resumption of normalization with the Zionist Entity, the partial European support for the U.S. position vis-à-vis Iran and the threats of NATO military intervention in the Sudan. The assassination has come amidst mounting international pressure against the Syrian presence in Lebanon, thus tightening the noose of arrogant colonial aims in the Middle East.
And for this and other views, Khalfi gets the ear of a Democratic Congressman and one of America's most prestigious scholarships.
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=22126
Guess this Democratic Senator doesn't feel this is a problem.
In fact, the entire Democratic party must be OK with it.
Why does that not surprise me.
--------
A Moroccan Islamist and apparent terrorism supporter has been getting treatment in Washington D.C. that most graduate students can only dream of. Mustafa Khalfi, editor-in-chief of the Moroccan newspaper At-Tajdid (Renewal), is the recipient of a prestigious Fulbright/American Political Science Association (APSA) Congressional Fellowship. This honor has afforded him the honor of working for Congressman Jim McDermott (D-WA), taking a course at Johns Hopkins University, and receiving a visiting scholarship at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
At-Tajdids connection to terrorism:
At-Tajdids website has a permanent link to the Union of Good, an umbrella organization of Hamas-funding charities. Five of these organizations have been listed by the U.S. Treasury Department as Specially Designated Global Terrorist entities (SDGTs):
* The Al-Aqsa Foundation, Belgium and Holland Branches
* Interpal
* Comité de Benfaisance et de Secours aux Palestiniens (CBSP)
* Sanabil al-Aqsa
* The Palestinian Relief Society, Switzerland
In addition, two more groups, The World Association of Muslim Youth (WAMY), and the International Islamic Relief Organization (IIRO), have been accused in a lawsuit filed by families of the 9/11 victims[1] of being connected to Osama bin Laden and two of his top operatives.
The Union of Good was established in October 2000 and is presided over by Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi and run by Essam Yussuf, a prominent figure in Interpal, a British Hamas front organization. Even the Palestinian Authority considers the Union of Good as a body supporting Hamas.
Clicking on the link to the Union of Good on the At-Tajdid website gives the reader a choice of English or Arabic. The English site takes the reader to the donations page of Interpal, a British-based charity that is designated by the U.S. as an SDGT. According to U.S. law, this is an indication that Khalfi himself should be designated a SGDT. A check of archived At-Tajdid websites shows this link to be a permanent feature since at least February 2003.
In August 2003, when the U.S. Treasury Department designated Interpal and several other Union of Good charities as SDGTs, it determined that they provide support to Hamas and form part of its funding network in Europe. In other words, Mustapha Khalfi is the editor of a newspaper that knowingly solicited funds for a SDGT.
Executive order 13224 is very clear about the criteria that the Secretary of the Treasury may use to designate an entity as a SDGT. Anyone determined to act for or on behalf of a listed entity or to provide financial support for, or financial services to or in support of entities designated in or under the Order or [t]o be otherwise associated with certain individuals or entities designated in or under the Order may be designated a SDGT. In other words, soliciting funds or even being associated with an SDGT is enough to get someone designated an SDGT.
Given the facts, it strains credulity to assert that Khalfi did not knowingly support funding Interpal or that he was not associated with the Union of Good. There is at least a prima facie case to designate Khalfi as a SDGT. The only possible recourse for a defender of Khalfi is try to exonerate him on a technicality. Khalfi certainly violated the spirit of executive order 13224 if not the letter, and the U.S. Treasury department is currently reviewing a dossier of our findings.
Also, At Tajdid is the official paper of an association called Al Islah Wa Attawhid, also known by its French acronym MUR (Mouvement de lUnicité et de la Réforme) which is closely linked to the same SDGTs. The MUR is a constituent organization of the Union of Good, which we described above. In addition, Dr. Abd Ziyad Al-Mughrabi al-Idrisi, who sits on the consultative council of the MUR and the secretariat of the PJD (Parti de la Justice et du Dévelopement), the main Moroccan Islamist party, is also a trustee of the Union of Good.
At-Tajdid and the MUR Islamist propaganda
At-Tajdid was among the first papers in the world to explain last year's horrific tsunami by pointing out that the affected Asian countries were corrupt and that the tsunami was a punishment from God. Later in the piece, At-Tajdid implied that the same punishment might be in the works for Morocco because of the lack of respect Moroccan society shows Islam. When pressed about this line of analysis, Khalfi answered, "Regarding the tsunami, only God knows the truth."
A Palestinian journalist, who often writes for At-Tajdid, declared that Hurricane Katrina was a "gift from Heaven." He added, "If the neocons were to see your enthusiasm and determination, they would realize that they will never win against our Ummah."
After Hamas victory in the Palestinians elections on January 25, At Tajdid wrote: The victory of Hamas is the result of Gods will and "is the beginning of the Palestinian peoples salvation.
The noted researcher and Islamogist Said Elakhal explained to the daily Aujourdhui Le Maroc that Hamas and the PJD have the exact same ideology. This should not come as a surprise since they both are branches of the Muslim Brotherhood.
The MUR website is hosting a whos who of extremists. It displays permanent links to:
· Yusuf Qaradawis website. Qaradawi has been called the spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood,[2] and has issued fatwas supporting suicide bombings, wife-beating, and calls for the Muslim conquest of Europe.
· www.Islamonline.net which publishes Qaradawis fatwas.
· www.daawa.net: Apparently a site of the Muslim Brotherhood, with a picture of brotherhood founder Hassan al-Banna displayed on every page.
· www.islamweb.net, which contains a presentation praising Hamas founder Ahmed Yassin.
Recently, the MUR website published a statement calling for a world day of protest of the Danish Mohammed cartoons. Significantly, the statement had a list of signatories, or supporters including:
o Five individuals openly identified as Muslim Brotherhood leaders
o Khaled Mashal of Hamas
o Mohammed al-Hamadawi, president of the MUR
o Saadine Othmani, general secretary of the PJD, who will visit Washington next month to meet US Congressmen.
Indeed, both the MUR and At-Tajdid websites recently displayed prominent links to the website of Yassin Day, an internet site dedicated to the loving memory of the work of Hamas founder Ahmed Yassin.
At Tajdid and the Zionists
The MUR website is replete with statements referring to the Zionist entity, glorious Hamas, and complaints about laws prohibiting Holocaust denial.
As the mouthpiece of a Hamas-supporting Islamist group, At-Tajdid takes a hard line against Jews. For instance, on December 15, 2004 Khalfi wrote an editorial entitled "The Israeli blackmail on France is still going on strong" on the French decision to ban Al Manar, i.e. Hezbollah TV, just recently designated a SDGT by U.S. Treasury thanks to the hard work of the Foundation of the Defense of Democracies.
Here is a chosen excerpt:
This decision is a sign of the increasing influence of the Zionist lobby in French domestic policy, as well as an increased French submission to Israeli pressure. This occurred while at the same time France adopts a more balanced foreign policy towards the Arab and Muslim world.(...)
France has been taken hostage by the Zionist lobby. The same can be said of the American democracy, hostage of the Christian far right working for Zionist interests. As De Gaulle did when he started the war of liberation of France, the free French must wonder whether it is not time to undertake a similar battle to liberate France from the Zionist blackmail, this new form of Nazism.
( ) This lobby exerts all kinds of pressure and blackmail on Frances political, cultural and media decision-making centers. Let me remind you for instance the defamation campaign conducted against the French intellectual Roger Garaudy, who had revealed the reality of the founding myths of Zionism.
We note that Garaudy is a French convert to Islam who is one of the most notorious Holocaust deniers in the world.
At Tajdid also usually speaks of the "Zionist entity" or puts the word Israel in scare quotes, indicating that it does not accept Israel's legitimacy as a nation. After the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, At-Tajdid's editorial read:
"Congratulations to the Palestinian resistance for this great victory which announces an even greater victory that of the recovery of Al Quds and all stolen Palestinian territories." In light of this one should not be surprised that At-Tajdid and Khalfi were opposed to any kind of peace process in the between the Israelis and the Palestinians--and even the normalization of relations between Morocco and Israel. In 1999, during a period of relative quiet between Israelis and Palestinians, the Egyptian daily Al-Ahram ran an article quoting Khalfi: Mustafa Khalfi, a writer who opposes Arab-Israeli normalization, criticizes this group's (Moroccan Jews) economic power because it "aims to influence decision-making [in Morocco]. As another example, during the recent Danish cartoon controversy, At Tajdid blamed a Zionist provocation aimed at reviving the conflict between the West and the Muslim nation.
The March 14, 2006 edition reproduces verbatim an entry published on The Al-Aqsa Organization website claiming that Israeli President Moshe Katsav declared war against the Al-Aqsa mosque.
At Tajdid and terrorism
On May 16, 2005, the second anniversary of the 2003 terror attacks on Western and Jewish targets in Casablanca, the whole of the Moroccan press--except At-Tajdid--commemorated the day. Instead, At-Tajdid went as far as to claim that the attacks were "a conspiracy against the Islamist movement." At-Tajdid has even expressed doubts about the existence of the Salafiya Jihadia, one of the main terrorist organizations behind the 2003 bombings in Morocco, referring to the group cryptically as "what some call the Salafiya Jihadia."
Mohamed Brini, the editor of the daily Al Ahdath Al Maghribia and an expert on At-Tajdid, says that At-Tajdid has never fully condemned a terrorist act, and instead often attempts to downplay terrorist incidents while making excuses for the perpetrators.
In fact, after the May 2003 terrorist attacks, there was a large consensus to ban the PJD, including Moroccos king Mohammed VI, but the US through its Ambassador pressured him successfully to give up this idea.
At Tajdid and the USA
Mustafa Khalfi isn't wild about the United States, either. After President Bush's reelection, in an editorial dated November 5, 2004, Khalfi wrote that the Arab and Muslim world was in for another four years of instability, insecurity, and increasing dominance of the "Zionist Right." He added: "The Arab and Islamic world must prepare for a very difficult stage which demands the strengthening of a common action and the reconciliation between the regimes and their peoples."
After the assassination of Lebanon's Rafiq Al Hariri, Khalfi saw another conspiracy in America's "arrogant colonial project." He wrote:
Despite the difficulty of identifying those who were behind the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, reactions have demonstrated that the assassination is part of a project that began with the mapping out of Iraqi election results, with the resumption of normalization with the Zionist Entity, the partial European support for the U.S. position vis-à-vis Iran and the threats of NATO military intervention in the Sudan. The assassination has come amidst mounting international pressure against the Syrian presence in Lebanon, thus tightening the noose of arrogant colonial aims in the Middle East.
And for this and other views, Khalfi gets the ear of a Democratic Congressman and one of America's most prestigious scholarships.
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=22126
