The frontline against Islamist extremism is no longer confined to physical battlefields; it is currently being waged in Western courtrooms. We are confronting a highly coordinated campaign of lawfare designed to systematically bankrupt and silence anyone with the courage to expose their subversion.
The problem. Islamist movements in the West long ago discovered that a lawsuit can do what an argument cannot: silence a critic without ever winning on the merits. Researchers, journalists, and ordinary citizens who document Islamism face defamation threats designed to bankrupt them into retraction. Moderate Muslims and reform-minded dissidents, often the bravest voices against the Islamists claiming to speak for them, are sued, threatened, and harassed into silence by organizations with deep pockets and patient counsel. The process is the punishment, and it is working.
The response. The Middle East Forum is expanding its legal capacity to meet this, and we are recruiting attorneys willing to take on the fight pro bono. The need runs in two directions. Defensively, we need media liability counsel for writers, researchers, and publications reporting on Islamist networks: pre-publication review, response to demand letters, defamation defense, and anti-SLAPP practice. Offensively, we need counsel to represent moderate Muslims, anti-Islamist activists, and dissidents targeted by Islamist lawfare, and to bring scrutiny (complaints, amicus work, and affirmative litigation where warranted) to organizations that abuse the courts to suppress lawful speech.
Who we are looking for. Attorneys admitted in any U.S. jurisdiction (allied common-law jurisdictions also welcome) with experience in one or more of: First Amendment and media law, defamation defense, anti-SLAPP litigation, civil rights, nonprofit regulatory work, or general commercial litigation with the appetite to learn this terrain. We welcome individual practitioners, law-firm pro bono programs, and law school clinics. Discretion is available for attorneys who prefer to serve without public attribution.
What you would work with. The Middle East Forum brings two decades of research on Islamist movements, a full-time investigative staff whose files have supported government designations and journalism on three continents, and a docket of live matters, from writers facing defamation threats for accurate reporting to activists confronting coordinated legal harassment. Volunteer counsel work alongside our staff with full research support; you bring the law, we bring the record.
The stakes. Free societies do not lose the argument over Islamism; they lose the right to have it, one settled case and one retracted article at a time. Every lawyer who takes one of these matters keeps that right open for everyone else.
To volunteer or learn more, contact:
Gregg Roman, Executive Director, Middle East Forum
Roman@MEForum.org
(215) 546-5406
Please include your jurisdiction(s) of admission, areas of practice, and approximate availability.
About the Middle East Forum
The Middle East Forum is a Philadelphia-based applied policy research organization that promotes U.S. interests in the Middle East and protects Western civilization from Islamist threats. Founded in 1994, MEF pairs rigorous analysis with direct-action programs to advance U.S. leadership, support America’s allies, and defend religious liberty worldwide.
For more information, visit www.meforum.org
