The Council on American-Islamic Relations warns that making an issue of Islamic terror incites “hate crimes” against innocent Muslims, but federal data disprove that. And commendably, the Obama administration is ignoring the Islamist pressure group’s latest bluff.
The White House has added top CAIR donor Saudi Arabia to a list of 14 mostly Muslim nations whose travelers will undergo extra airport-security screening in the wake of the Christmas Day airliner attack by a Muslim passenger. CAIR slammed the new policy as “across-the-board profiling” and griped “Muslims will pay the price for this one.”
That’s standard post-Islamic-terror bluster by CAIR, which remains under a cloud of terror suspicion itself following its 2007 federal designation as an unindicted co-conspirator in the largest terror finance case in U.S. history. The group is quick to argue that increased security only serves to demonize innocent Muslims and put a bull’s-eye on their backs.
But it’s a red herring, and one that can have the dangerous effect — designed or not — of taking authorities off the scent of radical Muslims.
After a Muslim Army officer last November opened fire at Fort Hood, while shouting “Allahu Akbar,” CAIR warned that coverage of the terrorist’s faith would trigger a violent “backlash” against Muslims. Many in the PC-drunk media dutifully refused to make the linkage, and the Pentagon still is refusing to do so.
But after the Washington Post published all 50 slides of accused terrorist Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan’s hateful PowerPoint screed against non-Muslims, CAIR could no longer hold back the obvious.
That was two months ago. Where are the predicted pitchforks? Despite CAIR’s omen of a surge in anti-Muslim “hate crimes,” thankfully there have been no reports of heinous attacks on Muslims anywhere in the U.S., including on military bases. In fact, the American Muslim Armed Forces and Veterans Affairs Council has not received a single report of even a Muslim soldier being harassed.
As was the case following the 9/11 attacks, Americans for the most part have been remarkably tolerant and respectful of Muslims and their institutions. And the latest FBI data on religiously motivated hate crimes bear that out.
Not only are anti-Islamic hate crimes way down, but they’re a fraction of overall religious hate crimes. FBI data show the overwhelming majority of such crimes target Jews, something CAIR and other Muslim groups don’t seem all that concerned about.
In 2008, a whopping 67% of religiously motivated attacks were against Jews, while just 7% targeted Muslims — even though the Jewish and Muslim populations are comparable in size. Even Christians, at 9%, account for a higher share of victims.
What’s more, anti-Islamic hate crimes are actually declining. In the most recent year, they totaled 105. While just one anti-Muslim hate crime is one too many, that’s a 9% decrease from 2007, a 33% drop from 2006, and a 78% plunge from 2001.
And again, the number is minuscule compared with the 1,013 offenses against Jews, up 5% from 2007. For every attack on a Muslim in this country, there are 10 against a Jew — attacks such as the recent fatal stabbing of a Jewish professor by a Muslim graduate student at New York’s Binghamton University.
The government data give lie to CAIR’s alarmist narrative of “Islamophobic” lynch mobs marching on mosques across America. Just last month, the Washington-based group complained to the White House about an “alarming level of anti-Islam hate in our nation.” In a press release, CAIR listed among recent hate crimes “a defaced Quran” and “anti-Islam remarks by Christian evangelist Franklin Graham.”
Another “alarming” example of “anti-Islamic hate,” it claimed, was “a call by far-right members of the U.S. House of Representatives to investigate Muslim interns on Capitol Hill as ‘spies.’”
In fact, the target of the investigation was terror-tied, FBI-shunned CAIR and its written goal of influencing congressional committees dealing specifically with homeland security — even though it’s not a registered lobbyist, is bankrolled by Arab governments, and is restricted in its political activities by IRS rules for non-profits.
CAIR also cries wolf to protect itself from due scrutiny. After the October release of my new book “Muslim Mafia” (which in part triggered the Hill probe), CAIR issued a press release claiming the “Muslim-bashing book” led to “death threats” against CAIR leaders.
First, the book does not bash Muslims, only CAIR and other radical Muslim Brotherhood front groups blacklisted by the government. And there was only one alleged “threat” — which came in the form of a cartoon faxed to CAIR’s national office. How serious and credible was it? The FBI declined to open a formal investigation.
By exaggerating hate crimes, CAIR shows it cares more about furthering its own political agenda than protecting ordinary Muslims. When real abuses occur, few Americans may pay attention. So CAIR does the Muslim community it claims to represent a disservice by exaggerating such crimes.
• Sperry, formerly IBD’s Washington bureau chief, is a Hoover Institution media fellow and author of “Infiltration.” His latest book is “Muslim Mafia: Inside the Secret Underworld That’s Conspiring to Islamize America.”