Albert Fox Cahn is the legal director for the New York chapter of the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations. Here he complains to a rabbi: “What does it say about your limits that I was excluded for nothing other than my affiliation with the nation’s largest, most-prominent Muslim civil rights organization, the Council on American-Islamic Relations?”
What does it say? It says that this rabbi is prudent and knowledgeable, and doesn’t suffer fools gladly. CAIR is an unindicted co-conspirator in a Hamas terror funding case — so named by the Justice Department. CAIR officials have repeatedly refused to denounce Hamas and Hizballah as terrorist groups. Several former CAIR officials have been convicted of various crimes related to jihad terror. CAIR’s cofounder and longtime Board chairman (Omar Ahmad), as well as its chief spokesman (Ibrahim Hooper), have made Islamic supremacist statements about how Islamic law should be imposed in the U.S. (Ahmad denies this, but the original reporter stands by her story.) CAIR chapters frequently distribute pamphlets telling Muslims not to cooperate with law enforcement. CAIR has opposed virtually every anti-terror measure that has been proposed or implemented and has been declared a terror organization by the United Arab Emirates. Ayloush himself in 2017 called for the overthrow of the U.S. government.
In light of all that, the idea of a CAIR operative, even a Jewish useful idiot, addressing a Jewish congregation is nothing short of obscene. The rabbi did the right thing.
Oh, and notice that it’s the far-Left Forward that is publishing this misleading, self-serving nonsense.
“I Was Barred From Speaking At My Temple Because I Work With Muslims,” by Albert Fox Cahn, Forward, June 11, 2018:
Dear Rabbi,
Please know that I don’t write this in anger, but with deep sadness — sadness at the setback we suffered on Friday. As a Jewish man who fights for the civil rights of Muslim New Yorkers, I know how hard it can be to find space for interfaith engagement. That’s why I was so thrilled by your invitation to give the d’var Torah (sermon) at last week’s service. Doing so would be an honor in any temple, but it held special meaning at the temple my family has belonged to for generations. My joy only multiplied when your interfaith partners named me keynote speaker for the iftar dinner that was to follow. To both give a Jewish sermon and break the Ramadan fast on a single Friday night, the night that both of our communities congregate to pray; it would be such a potent symbol of solidarity. A symbol needed now more urgently than ever as we await the Supreme Court’s forthcoming Muslim ban ruling.
Together, these plans exceeded my wildest dreams. Sadly, on Friday, those dreams died a quick death, when, on less than two hours’ notice, you not only disinvited me from delivering the d’var Torah, but you even barred me from appearing as the iftar keynote. I was permitted to enter the building, but you made clear that my voice could not be heard within its walls….
What does it say about the limits of your interfaith work that you were unable to host me: a Jewish, Harvard-educated civil rights attorney whose family first joined your temple six generations ago? What does it say about your limits that I was excluded for nothing other than my affiliation with the nation’s largest, most-prominent Muslim civil rights organization, the Council on American-Islamic Relations?…
Yours truly,
Albert Fox Cahn