Video: Emerson Confronts MPAC Spokeswoman
Fri, May 25, 2007 at 12:45:53 pm PDT
Terrorism expert Steven Emerson was on Larry Kudlow’s CNBC show Wednesday with Edina Lekovic, veiled spokeswoman for the LA-based Muslim Public Affairs Council, to talk about the Pew Research survey of Muslims in America.
In this clip Lekovic talks about all the ways MPAC is helping to fight extremism—but Emerson points out that in July 1999, while Lekovic was managing editor of the UCLA Muslim Students’ Association’s newspaper, al-Talib, she published an article titled “Jihad in America,” containing this passage:
“When we hear someone refer to the great Mujahid (someone who struggles in Allah’s cause) Osama bin Laden as a ‘terrorist,’ we should defend our brother and refer to him as a freedom fighter, someone who has forsaken wealth and power to fight in Allah’s cause and speak out against oppressors. We take these stances only to please Allah.”
Confronted with this fact, Lekovic denies she was the editor of the newspaper. But unfortunately for her, there is proof. (PDF file.)
Here’s the cover of that edition; it’s horrifying to see what was being openly espoused at UCLA in the years leading up to September 11, 2001—and to realize that the same people responsible for this are now promoting themselves and their organizations as “moderate.”
