Breitbart.com Offers $50K for Elusive Video of Obama Honoring Rashid Khalidi
US Breitbart News offers reward for video of 2003 speech honoring controversial Palestinian-American academic, Rashid Khalidi.
The US Internet news portal Breitbart News is offering a $50,000 reward to anyone who can provide a videotape of a 2003 dinner honoring a radical Palestinian American academic attended by then- Illinois state senator Barack Obama.
During the 2008 presidential campaign, the Los Angeles Times reported that Obama attended a farewell dinner in Chicago for his longtime friend Rashid Khalidi.
Khalidi reportedly served as the director of the PLO’s WAFA news agency in Beirut during the 1970s. At that time, the PLO was one of the most active terrorist organizations in the world.
The 2003 dinner was a tribute to Khalidi on the eve of his departure from the faculty of the University of Chicago. Khalidi left the university for Columbia University in New York City where he was appointed the Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies and the director of Columbia’s Middle East Institute.
Obama has acknowledged a close, long-term friendship between his family and the Khalidi family. Khalidi and his wife, Mona, who was the editor of the PLO’s English news service in Beirut from 1976 to 1982, hosted a fundraiser for Obama’s failed congressional campaign in 2000.
According to the Times report, at the 2003 dinner, Khalidi told his Palestinian American guests to support Obama’s 2004 bid for the US Senate. According to the report Khalidi said, ‘You will not have a better senator under any circumstances.’
During Obama’s tenure as a director on the board of the Woods Fund of Chicago, the charitable group donated $75,000 to Khalidi’s Arab American Action Network.
The Times article notes the virulently anti-Israel discussion that took place at the 2003 Khalidi dinner. Among other things, a Palestinian read a poem accusing Israel’s government of terrorism and sharply criticizing US support for Israel. The speaker reportedly threatened Israel, saying that if Palestinian interests are not secured, ‘then you [Israel] will never see a day of peace.’ Another speaker likened Israeli residents of Judea and Samaria to Osama bin Laden.
The report claimed that Obama struck ‘a different tone… and called for finding common ground,’ but provided no direct citations of his speech to that effect.
The event was videotaped and the Times reported that it had a copy of the video.
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