A plethora of
terror-related individuals surrounds the profile of Pastor
Rick Warren on the “Speakers Corner” of the official
website of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA). He
is fully aware of how he is being portrayed on the site
(as this author has had correspondence with his office
regarding the matter) but refuses to demand its deletion
and offers no apology for its existence. Pastor Warren has
become a shill for Islamic terror.
“As-salamu Alaykum. I
come to you today deeply humbled and honored by this
invitation. I truly mean that. I applaud your courage for
inviting an Evangelical pastor. Thank you.” This was the
opening statement of Rick Warren, the leading pastor of
the influential Southern California Saddleback Church, as
he stood in front of the attendees of ISNA’s 46th Annual
Convention in July 2009.
He spoke these words as
he stood at the podium emblazoned with ISNA’s logo, an
image that, for many, is a symbol of terror and stealth
jihad.
ISNA is an American arm
of the Muslim Brotherhood. It was founded in 1981 by a
group of individuals which included the North American
leader of Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) Sami al-Arian.
In 2007 and 2008, ISNA
was named by the United States Justice Department as a
willing participant in the financing of millions of
dollars to Hamas.
All of this and much
more had been made public prior to Pastor Warren’s
invitation to speak at ISNA’s convention, but all of it
was ignored.
At the convention,
Warren’s fellow speakers included: Siraj Wahhaj, an
“unindicted co-conspirator” of the 1993 World Trade Center
bombing; Zulfiqar Ali Shah, the former South Asia Director
of KindHearts, a Hamas fundraising group that was shut
down by the FBI in February 2006; and Naeem Muhammad, a
U.S. staff member of Islamic Relief, a “charity” that the
Israeli government has claimed is a front for Hamas.
Did Warren vet the other
speakers at the event? If he did, like with ISNA’s
terror-related past, the concerns were willfully ignored.
And today, he continues
to ignore the problems with ISNA, as a photo
of him along with his biography are featured prominently
on ISNA’s official website [1], within what the group
calls its “Speakers Corner.”
That makes Mr. Warren a
current assigned speaker for ISNA, a designation that he
seems to have absolutely no problem with.
In an e-mail addressed
to this author, dated February 1, 2010, Warren’s Chief of
Staff at Saddleback, David Chrzan, had the following to
say regarding Warren’s status on ISNA’s site: “The website
you reference lists Pastor Warren as one of the speakers
at the 2009 ISNA Conference held in Washington DC this
past July. Pastor Warren’s bio on the site does not
represent an endorsement of ISNA or its activities, but
rather as one of the speakers who was invited to address
the conference.”
It has now been well
over a year since ISNA had its 2009 annual convention.
Indeed, ISNA concluded its 2010 convention this past July
5th. So if Warren’s portrait was just about the 2009
event, why is it still there?
Of course, having one’s
picture on the ISNA site is more than just the remnant of
a one-off speaking engagement. It’s an acknowledgement
from those whose photos are displayed that ISNA is somehow
a legitimate institution that should be supported.
However, all one has to
do is look at the other individuals exhibited within the
ISNA “Speakers Corner” to understand that there is nothing
legitimate about the group. They include Nihad Awad and
Ibrahim Hooper, respectively the National Executive
Director and National Communications Director of the
Council on America-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a group, like
ISNA, that has been named by the U.S. government as an
accomplice to the financing of Hamas.
They include Hezbollah
supporter Maher Hathout, violent jihad advocate Esam
Omeish, terrorist defender Mahdi Bray, anti-woman
author/lecturer Jamal Badawi, and so many other extremist
members of the American Muslim community.
Chrzan went on, “While I
do not wish to offer an apologia for ISNA, I would refer
you to multiple articles that describe the organization’s
goals in reaching out to other faiths, including Judaism,
and denouncing terrorism[.]”
These goals of outreach
must have been overlooked, when ISNA was considering posting
to its official website an English language version of
the Quran
[2] which labels Jews “strongest among men in
enmity” and “men who will listen to any lie” and claims
that there is a “heavy punishment” for Jews in the
“Hereafter” — a version of the Quran which states that
“Allah’s curse” is upon Jews and Christians and calls on
Muslims not to take Jews or Christians for their “friends
and protectors.”
As well, the ISNA Quran
advocates beating women who are suspected of
“disloyalty” to their husbands.
This Quran has been up
on ISNA’s site for years, as it presently is today.
During Warren’s speech
to ISNA, he told ISNA’s conference attendees that he loved
them, and he stated to them, “[W]e need to work together.”
But how do you work together with an organization that
believes in and preaches hatred and violence towards
others?
You cannot. That is,
unless you are willing to become a party to the group’s
actions.
By speaking at ISNA’s
functions and by giving his consent to having his likeness
and biography placed on ISNA’s website, Pastor Rick Warren
has indeed become a party to ISNA’s actions. He has become
a pastor of terror.
You can tell a lot about
a person by the friends that he keeps, and Pastor Warren
keeps the wrong kind of friends.
Joe Kaufman is the
Chairman of Americans Against Hate [3] and the
founder of CAIR Watch. He has been responsible for the
closure of at least one terror-related charity and has
convinced a number of government officials to shun the
Hamas front group, CAIR. In June 2009, he won a lawsuit
brought against him by seven Dallas-area radical Muslim
organizations.
Beila Rabinowitz,
Director of Militant Islam Monitor [4] assisted
with this report.
