Did you hear? Focus on the Family, the nationally famous Christian Organization, has put a poster on their website in conjunction with an upcoming conference that they are holding to encourage Christians not to co-operate with the FBI!

JUST KIDDING!!!

In reality, though, a national religious organization has actually done this! The group in question in CAIR – The Council on American-Islamic Relations.

 The poster promotes an upcoming conference that encourages people not to talk to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. It was designed in the late 1970s or early 1980s and has been used by various groups and activists since then to whine about supposed harassment by the FBI and to protest being called in front of grand juries.

According to Ibrahim Hooper, a CAIR spokesman often seen on Fox News:

I think it’s subject to misinterpretation. We decided out of extreme caution to take it down.

Yeah, right.

Hooper was forced to sheepishly admit that the poster “crosses the line,”. However, he still defended the artwork and complained that critics had created a manufactured controversy:

The entire American-Muslim community is under the microscope right now with a cottage industry of Muslim bashers. We’re used to this kind of attack by the Islamophobic hate machine and in this case there is some justification in terms of the possibility of misinterpretation of this poster.

You want some cheese with that whine, Bubba?

The California chapter of CAIR will be holding a conference on February 9th at the East Side Cultural Center in Oakland (As if the city is not racially divided enough). The title of the conference is “FBI Raids and Grand Jury Subpoenas: Know Your Rights and Defend Our Communities.” Their keynote speaker is Hatem Abudayyeh, who has been identified by CAIR as an activist and Palestinian community leader whose home was allegedly raided by federal agents in September.

Hate ’em? How…appropriate.

Who is this keynote speaker?

Per aaan.org:

Hatem Abudayyeh has been with the Arab American Action Network (AAAN) since 1999, and was appointed Executive Director in 2003. The son of Palestinian immigrants who themselves were leaders in Chicago’s Arab community, Hatem was born in Chicago and coached varsity basketball and baseball as an administrative assistant at Mather High School before joining AAAN. He was elected Vice President of the Board of Directors of the Coalition of African, Arab, Asian, European, and Latino Immigrants of Illinois (CAAAELII) in 2006, is a founding Advisory Board member of the National Network for Arab American Communities (NNAAC), and sits on the National Coordinating Committee of the United States Palestine Community Network (USPCN).

His organization’s mission per their website:

The Arab American Action Network (AAAN) strives to strengthen the Arab community in the Chicago area by building its capacity to be an active agent for positive social change. As a grassroots nonprofit, our strategies include community organizing, advocacy, education, providing social services, leadership development, cultural outreach and forging productive relationships with other communities.

Our vision is for a strong Arab American community whose members have the power to make decisions about actions and policies that affect their lives and have access to a range of social, political, cultural and economic opportunities in a context of equity and social justice.

According to discoverthenetworks.org, AAAN is:

•  
  • Chicago-based organization established to promote the interests of the city’s large Arab-American population
  • Supports expanded rights for illegal aliens
  • Founded by anti-Israel professor Rashid Khalidi, former director of the PLO press agency and onetime moderator of PLO advisory committee

Rashid Khalidi…hey, that name sounds familiar.  Waitasecond.  Wasn’t he a friend of President Barack Hussein Obama (peace be upon him) while he was at Columbia University?

From an americanthinker.com article posted on May 23, 2008:

According to a professor at the University of Chicago who said he has known Obama for 12 years, the Democratic presidential hopeful befriended Khalidi when the two worked together at the university. The professor spoke on condition of anonymity. Khalidi lectured at the University of Chicago until 2003 while Obama taught law there from 1993 until his election to the Senate in 2004.

Sources at the University told WND that Khalidi and Obama lived in nearby faculty residential zones and that the two families dined together a number of times. The sources said the Obama’s even babysat the Khalidi children.

Khalidi in 2000 held what was described as a successful fundraiser for Obama’s failed bid for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, a fact not denied by Khalidi, who spoke to WND in February.

But, I digress…

Per Hooper, CAIR is not the only organization sponsoring the event. He also said that had no idea who was responsible for the artwork. Hooper said he was unable to provide a list of the other co-sponsors.

Unwilling, not unable.

Hooper said if anything negative is said about the FBI in this upcoming conference, it won’t come from their group.

We have a consistent policy of positive and constructive engagement with law enforcement officials.

And I’m a 22 year old Dallas Cowboy Cheerleader named Buffy.

According to a FBI spokesperson, appearing on Fox News Radio, they were aware of the poster but would not comment.

Former FBI assistant director Bill Gavin told Fox News Radio the poster is sending the wrong message to the Muslim community.

It sends out a real negative attitude to the Islamic community of what the FBI is really all about. This is just a propaganda tool to try and thwart an active investigation into criminal acts by a would-be terrorist group.

Why wouldn’t you talk to the FBI? If, in fact, there is something being done to destroy the image of Islam in the United States, then it should be stopped. We should put a positive face on Islam — not Islamic extremists.

Why, indeed.