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Emerson: Jersey's Counterterror Farce
Mon, Nov 12, 2007 at 12:50:11 pm PST
At the New York Post, Steven Emerson has another piece on yet another government outreach program that reaches out to the wrong people: Jersey’s Counterterror Farce.
November 12, 2007 — THE New Jersey Department of Homeland Security’s counterterrorism conference last month turned out to be a textbook case of exactly what’s wrong with many U.S. counterterror and outreach efforts - a farce that had apologists for terrorism and radical Islam writing the “script” for how to protect Americans from the terrorist threat.
Consider recommendation No. 7 from the final post-conference report:
“Universities can be breeding grounds for radicalization: . . . Most agreed that radicalization is most likely to find a breeding ground in the open environments of our college campuses, and thus it is essential to involve academia in any anti-radicalization strategy.”
True enough - except that a key speaker at the event was Georgetown University professor John Esposito. Esposito calls himself a “very good friend” of Sami Al-Arian - who last year pleaded guilty to a “conspiracy to make or receive contributions of funds, goods or services to or for the benefit of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad” - a terrorist group.
Esposito also heads Georgetown’s Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding - so named after the Saudi prince gave $20 million to the school. He should be a case study in how universities can promote radicalism, not a member of a panel discussing “anti-radicalization” strategies. ...
In other words, Jersey’s anti-terror conference concluded that we’re not in a war at all.
Finding No. 5 also repeats the claim that we should avoid the use of the terms “Islam” or “Muslim” when discussing the current threat, lest we play into the hands of the terrorists: “Because militant Islamist recruiters try to convince followers that Islam is under attack, we must be careful not to inadvertently feed that idea through the language we use.”Yet burying our head in the sand or refusing to name our enemies are no longer viable options. Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, Hamas and other groups justify the use of suicide bombers as a divine, religious rite. It might please the PC crew to describe the enemy as mere “common criminals” or petty thieves - but Americans have a right to know and discuss the belief system driving Islamic terrorists.
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