This is highly unusual, and probably a slip on Saylor’s part. I wouldn’t be surprised if Nihad Awad and Ibrahim Hooper call him in for a reprimand. The usual line that Hamas-linked CAIR takes, along with its Leftist and Islamic supremacist allies, is that “Islamophobia” is entirely a product of a well-heeled and sinister cabal of “Islamophobes” who have somehow succeeded in spreading “fear and hatred” of Muslims among a large segment of the American population, solely by means of malicious and mendacious propaganda.
This is arrant nonsense, and Hamas-linked CAIR has now admitted that it knows it is nonsense. The obvious reality is that no one would have a negative view of Islam or Muslims at all were it not for jihad massacres, boasts of imminent takeover, mass rapes by Muslim gangs, and the like. It is telling that Hamas-linked CAIR and its allies devote so much of their time and energy to demonizing and stigmatizing those who call attention to this activity and its justifications within Islamic teaching. Do they want to intimidate people into fearing to oppose the advancing jihad, so that it can advance unimpeded? It sure seems that way.
“Anti-Islamophobia Conference Only Tells Part of the Story,” by Dexter Van Zile, Algemeiner, May 16, 2018:
Corey Saylor, a prominent Muslim activist in the United States, made a stunning admission last week. Speaking at a counter-Islamophobia conference at the University of Minnesota, Saylor admitted that anti-Muslim sentiment is driven in part by jihadists who kill in the name of Allah.
During a session titled “How Islamophobia Became Mainstream,” Saylor told the audience in the Hubert Humphrey Auditorium that “violent extremist groups that claim that Islam gives sanction to their actions contribute to Islamophobia.”
“There’s no doubt about it,” he said. To not acknowledge the impact that groups like ISIS have had on attitudes about Islam and its adherents “would be to not have a complete conversation.”
Oddly enough, Saylor’s acknowledgement that jihadists make people frightened of Muslims and Islam took place at a conference organized by the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) — a group with historical ties to Hamas, a jihadist organization that, by Saylor’s logic, contributes to the problem he is trying to fix.
Such irony was baked into the overall agenda of the May 10, 2018 conference titled “Challenging Islamophobia.” For example, the conference, dedicated to promoting the rights of Muslims in American civil society, featured a talk by Hatem Bazian, a professor at UC Berkeley who has worked assiduously to undermine the rights of Jews on college campuses in the United States.
For example, Bazian founded two groups, Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and American Muslims for Palestine. Members of SJP have shouted down pro-Israel speakers and, in some instances, physically attacked Jews on college campuses.
During his talk, Bazian asserted that David Horowitz promoted Islamophobia in American society by writing The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America and getting it sold in airport bookstores.
“It’s not easy to get your book to be sold in airport bookshelves,” Bazian said. “There has to be some sophisticated marketing agency behind you.”
Horowitz’s targeting of academia, Bazian argued, “is part of a sophisticated campaign to neutralize possibility in an area where we could have sophisticated critique, not only of ourselves but also society in general.”
The absurdity is palpable. Bazian, who helped undermine the principles of civil society by establishing a cadre of anti-Zionist shock troops who harass Jews on college campuses, accuses Horowitz of undermining the ability of college professors to do their work. And how has Horowitz done this? Through engaging in a critique of his own by writing and selling a book….