Month: January 2010

Free speech victory against predatory Muslim groups

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Robert Spencer reports at FrontPage Magazine:

In a major victory for the increasingly embattled freedom of speech, the Texas Supreme Court has just denied a petition by the Islamic Society of Arlington, Texas and six other Texas-based Islamic organizations to review their case against human rights activist (and FrontPage Magazine writer) Joe Kaufman. The case has already gone against the Islamic groups in the initial decision as well as on appeal, but they seem determined to silence Kaufman, and could conceivably try now to take the case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Here’s how Joe Kaufman explains his case:

 “In October 2007, I had a lawsuit and a restraining order brought against me by seven Dallas-area Islamic organizations, who objected to an article that I had written for FrontPage. Not one of the groups was mentioned in the article. It was concerning information I had personally discovered linking the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) to the financing of terrorism abroad. My allegations regarding this were and are backed up by irrefutable proof.”

Spencer continues:

The suit itself is a manifestation of the global assault on free speech that is picking up steam more quickly than ever now, with conservative voices shouted down and physically threatened on college campuses, and warriors for free speech such as the Dutch politician Geert Wilders facing trial for exercising this fundamental right.

Perhaps the strangest and most ominous aspect of this case is that none of the groups bringing suit were mentioned in the article which they claim libeled them. But claiming to be offended often seems to trump everything, including rational argument, legal rights and even physical safety.  It’s not just radical Muslims who do this; it’s a favorite tactic of the left, particularly on college campuses, where conservative speakers are shouted down and sometimes physically attacked. Spencer gives an example:

Speaking at the University of Southern California on November 4, 2009, David Horowitz noted that this was a relatively recent development: “It used to be a pleasure for me to speak on a college campus like USC.  I can remember the days when I could stroll onto the USC campus and walk over to the statue of Tommy Trojan where College Republicans had erected a platform for a rally to support our troops in Afghanistan after 9/11 at which I was to speak.  Now, however, I can’t set foot on this campus – or any campus – without being accompanied by a personal bodyguard and a battalion of armed campus security police to protect me and my student hosts.” He said this while protected by a bodyguard and twelve armed campus security officers.

We post fairly frequently on free speech issues; in fact, we have a category devoted to it. This victory of Joe Kaufman’s is important but not necessarily final. I wouldn’t put it past the Muslim groups to appeal to the Supreme Court — there’s usually plenty of money available for such things among Muslim groups — but I doubt the high court would take the case. It would cost Joe Kaufman and FrontPage Magazine more money to respond, and they’re not as flush with funds (not having Saudi Arabia in their corner), so the Muslims might keep it going just to harass them.

And as Robert Spencer points out, this won’t stop the Muslim organizations from bringing more cases in the future.

Arizona demonstration against Sheriff is classic Alinsky, until it turned violent

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

We have previously mentioned the brave Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Phoenix, AZ. 

Yesterday throngs of demonstrators protested his enforcement of immigration laws in Maricopa County, focusing their ire on him to bring attention to the issue which is a classic Alinsky political strategy.   However, they defeated their purpose when they got violent (something Alinsky opposed).

Saul Alinsky, the now dead community organizer extraordinaire and the author of ‘Rules for Radicals’ (Obama’s training manual) said to isolate one person and demonize that person when promoting your cause.   That is what they were attempting to do Saturday in Phoenix, but it backfired.   Before you read on, you might want to visit this post I wrote awhile back about how the open borders activists were attempting to use Alinsky’s Rule 13 on Arpaio.

This is from AP yesterday:

PHOENIX – Thousands of immigrant rights advocates marched in front of a county jail in Phoenix Saturday in a protest that was aimed at Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s immigration efforts and was marked by a clash between a small group of protesters and police officers.

Organizers say the protest was meant to show officials in Washington that Arpaio shouldn’t handle immigration enforcement, and that Congress and the Obama administration need to come up with a way for immigrant workers to come to the country legally.

The three-mile walk that started in a west Phoenix park ended by afternoon at the Durango Jail Complex, a collection of five jails, where officials played music, including a record by singer Linda Ronstadt, to drown out noise made by protesters. Ronstadt took part in Saturday’s protest.  [Knowingly or unknowingly, Arapaio’s people were using a litte of Alinsky’s Rule 5—laugh at the opposition—when playing Ronstadt music turned up loud!]

Then the demonstrators made a huge error—they got violent and even beat up a horse!

For his part, Arpaio said he wasn’t bothered by the protesters and that they should be directing their frustrations at Congress because it has the power to change America’s immigration laws.

“They are zeroing in on the wrong guy,” Arpaio said. “They ought to be zeroing in on the president.”

The demonstration was peaceful until police say protesters near the end of the procession started throwing water bottles at officers. [read the whole account, it was more than water bottles]

[…..] 

Hill also said a police officer on horseback was assaulted while her horse was mobbed, punched and pushed.

Five demonstrators were arrested.

Alinsky opposed this sort of violence.  By doing what they did and even assaulting a horse, they pushed some people who might have been sympathetic to their cause to the other side.  Believe it or not, Alinsky was very angry with Bill Ayers and his Weather Underground because of that phenomenon—people will reject your cause if you are violent.  In other words, you will firm up the opposition, by driving more people to the other side.  Indeed this demonstration that turned violent will make the average citizen say, well, these aren’t people we want in our country.

There are millions of horse lovers in America.  Those fighting to halt illegal immigrant entry into the US should see if there is some good film footage and put the horse pummeling on Youtube!

For new readers:  We have a whole category entitled Community destabilization where we have over the last year and a half or so told you how the Leftwing organizes using the Alinsky-model and other strategies.

To unhappy Iraqi refugees: Contact the Iraqi Embassy, others

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I got to thinking about all we are hearing about Iraqi refugees struggling in the United States, living in substandard housing in dangerous neighborhoods and finding no jobs.  Most recently we had a firestorm of discussion at this post about Houston, TX about a volag leaving refugees high and dry and a similar story from Sacramento (here).  That is not to mention the twenty plus similar stories from other states in the last year or so.

Since it seems that the US State Department is not taking action, I suggest Iraqi refugees contact the Iraqi Embassy and report what is going on with the refugee program.  We had heard previously that the Iraqi government was paying for airfare home, here.   That is something our government isn’t going to do anytime soon because it would be rotten public relations having to admit that A) after all the fuss to get them here, some Iraqis want to go home, and B) it is my opinion that the Iraqi refugee crisis was overblown to score political points by the anti-war people in the government and in the volags, so sending them back would be an admission that the crisis was exagerated.  And, of course C) taxpayers would be furious to see the waste of their money.  But, frankly it is being wasted now with thousands of refugees on public assistance.

Here is the address for the Iraqi Embassy in Washington, DC.

US Flights home?

We reported previously that it is not unprecedented to airlift unhappy refugees to their home country.  We did it with huge numbers of Kosovars ten years ago, see this post I wrote about that last summer.

Contact the US State Department:

In addition to contacting the Embassy, be sure to write to the State Department Office of Population, Refugees and Migration, address here.

Contact the Iraqi Refugee Czar at the White House too!  Here is a press release from the White House in August naming Samantha Power* head of a new office on Iraqi refugees.  Write to her at:

Samantha Power

National Security Council

The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500

While you are at it, you might as well write to President Obama at that White House address too!

Since I’m on a roll, and hopefully you are too!

Complain to Inspector Generals!

Here are sites for information on reporting problems with refugee resettlement agencies for Health and Human Services, here.  Note you will be complaining about the Administration for Children and Families (that is where the Office of Refugee Resettlement is located).

The US State Department Inspector General fraud/complaints hotline is here.

Iraqis here on Special Immigrant Visas, also contact the List Project, here.

Contact newspapers in your city and explain the problem.

I used to recommend copying letters to your two US Senators and your Congressman, but they have become pretty useless.  However, if anyone is interested in addresses for them, contact me at Ann@vigilantfreedom.com and I will find yours for you.  It might be worth it if it’s only a matter of one more stamp and one more copy of your letter.

Note on writing letters:   Keep the cover letter simple, make a few key points.  If your English isn’t great, get help from someone who can speak English well (except for the Embassy letters, obviously they speak your language).  If you have lots of facts about your situation include those in an attached document.

* Yikes, completely off topic but for political junkies check out Samantha Power’s bio. here.  Readers may remember she had to resign from the Obama campaign in 2008 when she called now Secretary of State (refugees under her department) Hillary Clinton a “monster.”   Later she married Obama’s White House regulatory czar Cass Sunstein.

Canada withdraws funds from UNRWA, the UN agency that funds Palestinian “refugees”

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

David Bedein reports in the Philadelphia Bulletin:

Jerusalem — A senior Canadian government official has briefed officials in Israel and the Palestinian Authority with the news of Canada’s decision to defund the United Nations Refugee Works Agency (UNRWA) which administers 59 refugee camps for Palestinian Arab refugees and their descendents who left their homes in the wake of the 1948 war.

UNRWA maintains Palestinian Arab refugees in their facilities under the premise and promise of return to homes and villages from 1948 that no longer exist.

All other U.N. refugee camps around the world ascribe to the principles of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), which mandates that a refugee has a right to be resettled in new conditions.

Apparently the European Union commissioned a report on UNRWA which concluded that Hamas terrorists were administering UNRWA facilities.  We’ve reported on Hamas’s domination of UNRWA before (here, for example) though not on the EU report. In October I posted on a bill in the House of Representatives to attempt to block UNRWA’s terror ties; the bill had been stalled in the Foreign Affairs Committee (chaired by Howard Berman, D-CA) since January 2009 and is still there a year after its introduction.

I guess Canada is way ahead of us here, as they have taken the only kind of action that counts in response to the EU report. Bedein concludes:

Canada heads the “Refugee Working Group (RWG),” a subgroup of the Middle East negotiation process which was established in the wake of the Madrid Middle East Summit in October 1991, to oversee Palestinian refugee policy for the 38 nations that contribute to UNRWA.

The fact that Canada has used its position as the head of the RWG to defund UNRWA will most likely not go unnoticed by the 38 countries that contribute to the half a billion-dollar UNRWA budget.

 The U.S. under our current government no longer cares much about promoting human rights and fighting Islamic terrorism, so let’s hope some other countries gather up their courage to take our place until we can resume our leadership.

Some other reports here, here, and here make it clear that Canada is not stopping its aid to Palestinians, but the aid will now go directly to  specific projects rather than through UNRWA.

Iraqi refugees overwhelm Detroit-area nonprofits — and are they Christian?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

The headline of the Assyrian International News Agency article is actually Thousands of Iraqi Refugees Overwhelm Service Agencies in Detroit.  But I knew you would think that meant government welfare agencies, while it really means private self-help  groups. It begins:

Prior to 2006, strict immigration policies didn’t allow refugees fleeing the violence in Iraq to enter the United States. In 2007, a more lenient “open door” policy was implemented, allowing thousands of Iraqis –15,000 in 2009 alone– to settle in the Detroit area. Now, local Arab community groups that stepped up to help the refugees say they are overwhelmed by the burden of taking care of the new arrivals.

In a recent interview on WDET’s Detroit Today, Joseph Kassab, executive director of the Chaldean Federation of America, and Abdallah Boumediene, from the Arab Community Center for Economic and Social Services [ACCESS], acknowledged that the Arab community in Michigan can’t deal with the crisis by itself.

With little to no support from the local, state or federal governments, Detroit’s Middle Eastern community has to deal with providing thousands of displaced Iraqis with housing, health care, education, transportation and jobs.

Assyrians are Christian, though the website never seems to mention the word. And of the two groups mentioned, Chaldeans are Christian, and have been settling in Michigan for many decades. I can’t tell about the other group, ACCESS. Abdallah must be a Muslim name. The site itself doesn’t mention either “Muslim” or “Christian,” but its calendar shows events for Caldeans and Maronites, who are Christian, and also a celebration of Iftar, a Muslim holiday.

I started to post just on the original article, but got sidetracked on this Christian-Muslim question because it intrigued me. At first I thought the groups mentioned must be Christian, because Muslims generally aren’t shy about proclaiming their religion, whereas Christians might be, having been persecuted in the Middle East for so long. Usually inter-faith groups like to give that fact prominence: it’s so heartwarming, especially to entities that hand out money. But perhaps Christian and Muslim Arabs in Michigan, or some among them, work together amicably in ACCESS, and don’t wish to trumpet this cooperation to the world. Muslims, especially, would catch hell from some of their co-religionists for working closely with Christians, while the Christians might have their sanity questioned. Maybe somebody who knows more can let us know.

Now, to get on with the report:

Local non-profits are not only dealing with resettling the newly arrived, they’re also trying to cope with serious mental health issues suffered by many refugees. Iraqis often have had family members kidnapped, tortured or killed. Families experience depression, loneliness and the post-traumatic stress caused by living in a war-torn country.

“We deal with tragic situations and stories of people who have gone through horrendous experiences,” Boumediene said.

The agencies say they are committed to fully supporting the newly arrived, despite what they say is a lack of support from the government.

“We don’t want to re-victimize these people,” Kassab said. “These people are victims of torture, victims of persecution, victims of failed policies and therefore they should be helped.”

This does sound more Christian than Muslim, but who knows? At any rate, praise to these groups, whatever religion they are, who are trying to do what should be done, without much government help.

Ann previously posted on the Chaldeans in Michigan in 2008, here, and pointed out that the community was helping the refugees, not the government. And a later post pointed out that although the State Department had stopped settling refugees in Detroit, Iraqis settled in other areas of the country went there on their own. And why not? It sounds as if the Chaldeans and perhaps other groups there have the best resettlement program in the country.