7/24/13 AIFD Congratulates Robert P. George on his election as USCIRF Chair

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Statement
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

AIFD congratulates Robert P. George on his election as USCIRF Chair

AIFD founder Zuhdi Jasser elected Vice Chair

 PHOENIX (July 24, 2013) – The American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) commends the election of Professor Robert George as the Chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom and the election of AIFD founder and president Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser and Dr. Katrina Lantos Swett as the Vice Chairs.

Professor George is the McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University and a Visiting Professor at Harvard Law School. He was appointed to USCIRF in 2012 by Speaker of the House John Boehner and is serving his first term as a Commissioner.

“I am so pleased to be able to serve in support of Chairman George,” said Dr. Jasser.  “Professor George is a tireless defender of religious liberty and its importance not only to the principles of human rights, but also its centrality to national security. It will continue to be an honor and a privilege to work closely with Professor George. I look forward to a very productive year under his stewardship.”

Dr. Jasser was appointed to USCIRF by Minority Leader Senator Mitch McConnell in 2012.  He is the founder and president of AIFD which advocates for the preservation of the founding principles of the U.S. Constitution, liberty and freedom, through the separation of mosque and state. He is also a founding member of the American Islamic Leadership Coalition which represents a diverse group of reform minded American Muslim leaders. The son of Syrian immigrants, Dr. Jasser is a former Lieutenant Commander in the United States Navy where he served 11 years. Dr. Jasser is a nationally recognized expert who is widely published and has spoken at hundreds of national and international events and given testimony to Congress on the value of the centrality of religious liberty in the contest of ideas within Islam. Dr. Jasser is the author of A Battle for the Soul of Islam and a physician currently in private practice in Phoenix Arizona specializing in internal medicine and nuclear cardiology.

“USCIRF serves an important role in protecting religious freedom in all of the countries which our commission laid out in our 2013 report,” said Jasser. “I specifically look forward to continuing to bring my experiences with the challenges facing so many countries around the world navigating the conflicts between political Islam (Islamism) and liberty.”

Dr. Lantos Swett is the outgoing chair of USCIRF and an appointee of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. She is president of the Lantos Foundation where she works to carry on the human rights legacy of her father, the late Representative Tom Lantos. She teaches human rights and American foreign policy at Tufts University.

“I commend Dr Swett on her remarkable and exemplary leadership of our commission over the past year,” said Jasser.  “I look forward to continuing to work closely with her in the coming year as a fellow vice chair.”

The USCIRF election took place at the commission’s monthly meeting on July 23, 2013. To interview a USCIRF Commissioner, please contact USCIRF at (202) 523-3258 or media@uscirf.gov. USCIRF’s media release can be found here.

Dr. Jasser is available for interviews by contact Gregg Edgar at 602-690-7977 or gedgar@gcjpr.com.

About the American Islamic Forum for Democracy

The American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) charitable organization. AIFD’s mission advocates for the preservation of the founding principles of the United States Constitution, liberty and freedom, through the separation of mosque and state. For more information on AIFD, please visit our website at http://www.aifdemocracy.org/.

MEDIA CONTACTS:         Gregg Edgar

Gordon C. James Public Relations

602-690-7977

gedgar@gcjpr.com

7/23/13 Uproar over ‘Rolling Stone’ cover photo missed real story

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By M. Zuhdi Jasser

My Turn

Arizona Republic

Tue Jul 23, 2013

Rolling Stone’s August cover story on Boston Marathon bombing suspect, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, elicited a surprising public furor largely focused on the “rock star” treatment of Tsarnaev in its cover photo.

Did 19-year-old Tsarnaev look “too cool or too glamorous” for someone suspected of committing a terror attack?

Did the accompanying story balance that by revealing the real workings of his radical mind?

The coverage fixated on the glamour shot instead of the substance lacking in the story itself, but our nation needs to have a deeper conversation about how Muslims “next door” become our enemies.

In more than 10,000 words of intrigue and victimization, Janet Reitman wove a narrative that Tsarnaev was a victim of a mentally ill older brother and, worse yet, that America may have failed these poster boys of Islamist radicalism. She gave little to no credence to the intoxicating role of global Islamist ideology — political Islam — upon his radicalization.

Rolling Stone readers gained little understanding of how this normal-looking kid became a suspect in a cold-blooded terror attack that killed three people and injured at least 260 in the streets of Boston. For aspiring copycat Islamists, Reitman’s soft narrative may engender sympathy to global Islamism or “jihadi cool.”

The uproar over the photo missed the real story: Tsarnaev’s normal, unsuspecting looks define the face of terror for many Islamists who threaten our freedom. Maj. Nidal Hasan and Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad, to name a couple, appeared to be everyday Americans. But when we peel back the skin-deep facade and get to the ideological primer that inspired these men, we find the root of Islamist extremism.

The common pathway for most Islamist radicals such as the brothers Tsarnaev is their enlistment into a violent form of Islamo-patriotism or jihad against America. That treason is not posted on their foreheads.

It’s easier when our enemy fits the stereotype of the prototypical jihadist: unkempt, bearded, shouting “Allahu Akbar” and locked up in an orange jumpsuit ready for death row. It’s anesthetizing to believe we can always pick them out of a lineup. The intoxicant of radical Islamism can infect any good-looking teen or young adult.

Most Islamists on their way toward militant radicalization look more like Dzhokhar Tsarnaev than Osama bin Laden.

Rolling Stone lost an opportunity to teach us that while not every Muslim is an Islamist, every Islamist could be headed down the common global path of anti-American radicalization as a threat to our national security.

The cover photo was sadly accurate. Once we accept that there is no way to effectively profile their outward appearances, we’ll be forced to begin to figure out how to counter the Islamist narratives that infect our enemies.

All Americans, and especially Muslims, need to face the fact that any Muslim who believes in the political supremacy of loyalty to political Islam is susceptible to radicalization at home, in our families and communities, on the Web and abroad. To ignore that threat is to leave our nation in peril.

M. Zuhdi Jasser is author of “A Battle for the Soul of Islam” and president of the Phoenix-based American Islamic Forum for Democracy.

As Muslims begin the month of Ramadan, AIFD sends its blessings and renewed dedication to freedom for all

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STATEMENT FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

PHOENIX (July 9, 2013) – Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, a devout Muslim and the president and founder of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) issued the following statement regarding  the start of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan on Tuesday, July 9, 2013, or Ramadan 1, 1434 of the Islamic Hijri Calendar:

“Today, we begin the commemoration of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan. We wish all Muslims a ‘Ramadan Kareem’ and a blessed and rewarding month of fasting and self-reflection.

During this, the ninth month of our lunar calendar and the holy month of fasting, we are all reminded of the most important things in life, and to focus our gratitude on them. We are reminded to give thanks for good health, while keeping the suffering in our prayers; of our families, as well as our personal relationships with our Creator.

We are reminded of the sanctity and safety of this great nation which we call home, and which gives us the comfort and freedom to sincerely engage in the humble spiritual renewal that is Ramadan.

These are values many American Muslims all hold dearly, but may often come to take for granted.

As we abstain from food and drink during the day in this blessed land of freedom, we are again reminded of our brothers and sisters of all faiths in Syria who are dying by the thousands at the barbaric hands of their own government. This year marks the third Ramadan in their revolution against Assadist tyranny. At the end of last Ramadan, the death toll had reached 20,000 with over 250,000 Syrians displaced. This Ramadan, the death toll is approaching 100,000, with over 2 million Syrians displaced. The millions of displaced Syrians see little hope in site for the end of Assad’s killing machine and terror factory.

Since last Ramadan, Syria’s noble struggle against Assad’s Ba’athist tyranny has been transformed into the world’s wasteland for militant jihadists— leaving innocent Syrians of all faiths caught hopelessly in the middle. May our prayers and our works be dedicated to ending their suffering and bringing them the freedom that we are blessed with here in America. We continue to remember, with a humble and solemn recognition, the Syrian people continuing to fight against unthinkable evil and great uncertainty. Many of them will go without necessary food, shelter, and the comfort of family. It is this recognition – which calls us to the duty to serve our fellow man – which lies at the heart of Ramadan.

This week, we have seen the Egyptian people’s courageous and determined struggle against both the tyranny of military dictatorship and the equally oppressive force of Islamism, which they have rejected in just one year with the largest demonstrations in history. . May this Ramadan see Egypt harness that incredible energy to unite Egyptian men and women of all faiths and none against both forms of tyranny.

The fast of Ramadan is a symbolic equalizer for all Muslims. From the very rich to the very poor we find common goodness in the challenges and rewards of the daily fast. The hunger and thirst we share allows us to share a common appreciation for the gifts we have at home and in this nation.

This month, we renew our daily efforts to remind our brothers and sisters of all faiths and none that we, as liberty-minded American Muslims, not only cherish western freedoms, but that the solution to global Islamist radicalism must come from moderate, liberty minded Muslims.

We are blessed to take this opportunity to wish Muslims worldwide a blessed and safe Ramadan, and a spiritually fulfilling fast.

About the American Islamic Forum for Democracy

The American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) charitable organization. AIFD’s mission advocates for the preservation of the founding principles of the United States Constitution, liberty and freedom, through the separation of mosque and state. For more information on AIFD, please visit our website at http://www.aifdemocracy.org/.

MEDIA CONTACTS: Gregg Edgar
Gordon C. James Public Relations
gedgar@gcjpr.com
602-690-7977

Obama has failed in the Middle East and the fight against Islamist extremism

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Statement

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Obama has failed in the Middle East and the fight against Islamist extremism

Congress needs to be focused on real solutions to the Islamist threat

 

 PHOENIX (May 21, 2013) – Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, a devout Muslim and author of “A Battle for the Soul of Islam: An American Muslim Patriot’s Fight to Save His Faith” released the following statement on behalf of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) regarding the Obama Administration’s failures in Syria, Benghazi and Boston:

“Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey visited the White House on May 16 to discuss the ever growing genocide that is taking place in Syria.  Erdogan reportedly pressed for greater U.S. intervention in Syria. He presented further evidence of Syrian use of chemical weapons against the rebels and its own people in an effort to push for action from President Obama on his own self-imposed red line.

Erdogan’s visit comes in the middle of a heated political debate about the handling of the September 11, 2012 attack in Benghazi, Libya and following congressional hearings on the administration’s failures in both Benghazi and the Boston Marathon attack.

The White House is under increasing pressure for its failures in the Middle East and its counterterrorism efforts. The President has done little to instill confidence that our Commander-in-Chief has a firm grasp on the threat that we face.

In a May 13 press conference with British Prime Minister Cameron, he seemed annoyed that he had to address the issue of Benghazi at all, stating that ‘there’s no “there” there’.  The reality is that the President isn’t even being asked the most important questions.

While Congress is correct to confront the President’s handling of these attacks, they have yet to truly get to the heart of the President’s failures, which lie in his inability to address the underlying ideology behind them. While we cannot ignore the details of a possible cover up in Benghazi, we also cannot afford to miss the forest for the trees… The real check on this President over Benghazi and Boston should be a confrontation over the administration’s inability to understand and provide a coherent strategy against the ideology which ties all of these incidents together. The American people deserve real answers for what happened, but more importantly, real solutions to the problems.

The global ideology of political Islam is the unifying thread between Boston and Benghazi. This same ideology is the impetus behind why countries like Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey are motivated to support the Islamist elements of the opposition in the Syrian Civil War. Without a strategy, Islamists will continue to rise from the dust of the “Arab Awakening” as this administration outsources American interests to our enemies across the Middle East. The President’s failure to grasp the import which the Islamist ideology is having in fueling our enemies and threatening us at home will have a deleterious impact on the region and our security for generations to come.

Syria could have been, and may still be, a very real opportunity to develop a secular free society in the heart of the Middle East rather than a breeding ground for Islamist hegemony in the region. The President himself said that ‘the humanitarian crisis and the slaughter that’s taking place [in Syria] by itself is sufficient to prompt strong international action.’

Mr. President, strong international action needs leadership. It needs determination from the White House to stand on the principles that created our free society and promote a foreign policy that embraces freedom around the world instead of just half-heartedly reacting to flashpoints of militancy. We need a leader that will be steadfast in the development of a doctrine based in liberty against our ideological enemies.

Congress and the White House need to shift their focus to solutions.  The fight over talking points, while important, does nothing to solve the problem of Islamist extremism which killed these brave men.

If we continue to cede the ideological battle to our enemy, they will continue to bring terror to our shores.”

About the American Islamic Forum for Democracy

The American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) charitable organization. AIFD’s mission advocates for the preservation of the founding principles of the United States Constitution, liberty and freedom, through the separation of mosque and state. For more information on AIFD, please visit our website at http://www.aifdemocracy.org/.

MEDIA CONTACTS:         Gregg Edgar

Gordon C. James Public Relations

gedgar@gcjpr.com

602-690-7977

####

[USCIRF Release] SYRIA: The Sectarian Divide

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Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, President & Founder of AIFD is a member of the US Commission on International Religious Freedom. The Commission released this statement today.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

SYRIA: The Sectarian Divide 

WASHINGTON, D.C., May 16, 2013 –   The two-year armed conflict in Syria has left at least 80,000 people dead and more than 5 million displaced.  In his May 13, 2013 press conference with UK Prime Minister David Cameron, President Obama noted the difficulty of  “putting things back together” in Syria after “the furies have been unleashed.”

 These “furies” include a brutal conflict that increasingly is sectarian in nature. The recent massacre in Bayda and the kidnapping of bishops of the Syriac and Greek Orthodox Churches underscore the fact that what began as a political struggle in Syria has become a war in which sectarian rhetoric and religiously-motivated violence have led to sectarian divides.

 “We are deeply worried for the lives of Archbishop Mor Gregiorius Yohanna Ibrahim of the Syriac Orthodox Church and Bishop Boulos Yazigi of the Greek Orthodox Church, who were kidnapped on April 22while providing humanitarian aid to the war-ravaged people of Syria,” said USCIRF Chair Katrina Lantos Swett.  “These two religious leaders put aside their own safety by travelling to one of the worst areas of fighting to help those Syrians left with few basic necessities after more than two years of war. The United States and the international community must leave no stone unturned to free the Archbishops and halt sectarian violence,” said Dr. Swett.

 The civil war in Syria began in March 2011 when peaceful protests by mostly Sunni Muslim opponents of the al-Assad regime called for the repeal of the country’s abusive emergency law, space for political parties, and the resignation of President Bashar al-Assad.  The civil war that has now entered into its third year has caused at least 80,000 deaths 1.3 million refugees and at least 3.6 million internally displaced people.  The brutal massacre by al-Assad’s armed forces in the town of Bayda on May 2 claimed the lives of dozens, including women and children, largely from that town’s Sunni Muslim community.

 “The use of sectarian violence and rhetoric will destroy any hope that Syria will emerge from this war as a representative democracy in which human rights and religious freedom for all Syrians is promoted and protected,” said Dr. Lantos Swett. “The kidnapping of the Archbishops and the massacre of innocents are only the latest attempts to inflame tensions between religious communities and divide them along sectarian lines. The al-Assad regime and some opposition forces, including those foreign to Syria who espouse violence based on extreme religious ideologies, increasingly are stoking sectarian tensions as a tactic in the civil war.”

 USCIRF’s report, “Protecting and Promoting Religious Freedom in Syria” includes preliminary findings and recommendations on the situation in Syria and underscores the detrimental effects of sectarianism on Syria’s current and future religious freedom environment.

 

To interview a USCIRF Commissioner please contact Samantha Schnitzer at (202) 786-0613 orsschnitzer@uscirf.gov.

 The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom was created by the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 to monitor the status of freedom of thought, conscience, and religion or belief abroad, as defined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and related international instruments, and to give independent policy recommendations to the President, Secretary of State, and Congress.

Visit our Web site at www.uscirf.gov
Katrina Lantos Swett, Chair * Mary Ann Glendon, Vice Chair * William Shaw, Vice Chair * Elliott Abrams  * Sam Gejdenson * Robert P. George * M. Zuhdi Jasser  * Eric P. Schwartz * Jackie Wolcott, Executive Director
732 NORTH CAPITOL STREET, NW SUITE A714
WASHINGTON, DC 20401
202-523-3240 | 202-523-5020 (FAX)

AIFD joins Middle East American Coalition for Democracy in plea to United Nations for international support to civil society NGO’s in response to Arab Awakening

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Middle East American Coalition for Democracy

2300 M Street NW

Suite 800

Washington DC, 20037

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
AIFD joins Middle East American Coalition for Democracy in plea to United Nations for international support to civil society NGO’s in response to Arab Awakening

Group sends memo to UN Chief asking for coordinated strategy to prioritize engagement of liberal civil society groups in the Middle East

(New York–May 16, 2013) — A number of Middle East NGO leaders joined efforts in a full day of meetings with Secretariat General’s officials and with various missions at the United Nations on Tuesday, May 7, 2013 to demand an international engaging with civil societies in the Greater Middle East in general and with Arab Spring peoples in particular.

The Middle East American Coalition for Democracy presented a memorandum to the UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-Moon entitled:  “A Plea for United Nations to begin a coordinated strategy to prioritize engagement of liberal civil society groups in the Arab Awakening” and focused on that sentiment at their landmark meetings with the following missions:

 Ambassador Terje Roed Larsen and staff, President of the International Peace Institute and Special Envoy for US Secretary General to Lebanon for the Implementation of UN Resolution 1559 and 1701.

 

Ms. Antonella Caruso and staff, UN Director of Middle East and West Asia

 

Mr. Javier Sanabria, Minister Counsellor, of Spanish Mission at the U.N

 

Mr. Andrey Listov, Counsellor of Russian Mission at the U.N.

The coalition represented many of the expatriate communities of Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, and Tunisia and called for the meetings in order to highlight the dire situation for liberal civil society groups who despite the promise and hope of new beginnings in the Arab Awakening have been left with the same resources they had under dictatorship- none. They highlighted how the civil society NGO’s are trapped between the old forces of dictatorship and the emerging Islamist fundamentalist forces, particularly Salafists, which have for long been far better organized and fueled with an entrenched regional infrastructure against which they cannot compete without the support of the free world. The coalition was joined and advised by Dr. Walid Phares, the Co-Secretary General of the Transatlantic Legislative Group on Counter Terrorism, a caucus of members of the US Congress and the European Parliament focusing on defending democracy internationally and particularly in North Africa and the Middle East

Tom Harb, chair of the Middle East American Coalition for Democracy asked during the meetings that the culture at the U.N. begin to adapt to the post Arab Spring realities stating that, “the U.N. should rather than simply and exclusively address the old power structures of governments often led by autocrats now facilitate the expansion of programs and engagement with those organizations which share our Western ideals of liberal democracy including reformers, women, and minorities.”

Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy and Save Syria Now! asked missions during meetings that, “as the Arab Awakening evolves, each nation finds itself in a once-in-a-generation or even millennium tipping point for simply the chance at genuine modern reform and change. It is our hope that you can help us give the democracy forces in civil society on the ground in each nation a chance to get their campaigns for freedom and liberty heard among the citizenry. Without the U.N. on their side they will not be heard. Egypt, Tunisia and especially Syria are each proving that in their own very unique way. We are certainly dedicated to these nations having the right to self-determination. But it is that very right to self-determination of the majority and the minorities of their citizenry on the ground which brings us to you. We come together to ask you to help us protect the right to self-determination of liberal groups, women’s groups, minorities, and secularists to name a few.”

The Coalition hopes to come back and engage a broader array of missions at the U.N. with regards to establishing a global strategy in the wake of the Arab Awakening. They left asking parties to consider asking the Secretary General to establish a “Special Envoy to the Arab Awakening”. The day of meetings at the United Nations were joined in the Coalition by:

Dr M. Zuhdi Jasser, President Save Syria Now and the American Islamic Forum for Democracy (Arizona)

Robert Ozgun, Representative Syriac National Council (N.Y.)

Dr Adel Kobeish, Chairman, Voice of Egypt NGO (DC)

Mokhtar Kamel, Executive Director, President of the Egyptian American Alliance.(VA)

Dr Essam Abdallah, Egyptian Liberals Movement (VA)

Sheikh Sami Khoury, former Consul General of Lebanon in Ecuador, former President of the World Lebanese Cultural Union (WLCM) and President of the World Maronite Union

Eblan Farris, Communications Director, World Council of the Cedars Revolution (D.C.)

Sana Karray Hababou, coordinator Tunisia Democracy NGOs, New York area.

Tom Harb, Co-Chair, Middle East Americans Coalition for Democracy

Dr. Walid Phares, advisor and Congressional advisor. Washington DC

 

During the meetings, Dr Zuhdi Jasser and Robert Ozgun reported on the dramatic and bloody developments in Syria urging a UN intervention to stop the suppression by the regime and at the same time insure the isolation of Terror groups infiltrated in the opposition. “Priority in Syria,” said Ozgun is to protect the Syrian population in general and its weakest elements, women, children and minorities.” On Egypt, Dr Adel Kobeish and Mokhtar Kamel underlined the deterioration, both political and economic and asked for a protection of peaceful demonstrators after months of targeting at the hands of armed elements. Sana Hababou, from the Tunisian NGOs, said “civil society in general and women in particular are very concerned about the new constitutional document which diminishes their fundamental rights.” She also indicated that armed extremist militias are expanding in the country, menacing the democratic achievement of the first revolution of the Arab Spring.” Last on Lebanon, Sheikh Sami el Khoury and Eblan Farris warned about the systematic domination of the country by Hezbollah militia, against the stipulation of UNSCR 1559 and 1701 and the rising competition between the pro-Iranian network accused in the assassination of Prime Minister Hariri and nascent Salafi armed groups. Finally, commenting on the meetings, Dr Walid Phares said “this is a first step in the internationalization of the support to the Arab Spring and the freedom movements in the region. Since 2011, civil societies in the region, though first to rise for political change and democracy, have been sidelined by stronger and more organized militant forces and regimes. Hence Arab and Middle NGOs, both in the region and worldwide, are coalescing to engage the international community directly, starting with the United Nations, in order to grow a direct partnership under international law and in the interest of implementing humanitarian values and human rights.”

MEMORANDUM

DATE: May 7th , 2013

 

From:   Middle East Americans Coalition for Democracy

 

To:       United Nations Secretary General

Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon

Executive Office of the Secretary-General

U.N. Headquarters #S-3800

New York, NY 10017

SUBJECT: PLEA FOR UNITED NATIONS TO BEGIN COORDINATED STRATEGY TO PRIORITIZE ENGAGEMENT OF LIBERAL CIVIL SOCIETY GROUPS IN THE ARAB AWAKENING

The Honorable Ban Ki-Moon,

1. Our American NGO’s representing the expatriate communities of Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, and Tunisia call for these meetings in order to highlight the dire situation for liberal civil society groups who despite the promise and hope of new beginnings in the Arab Awakening have been left with the same resources they had under dictatorship- none. They are trapped between the old forces of dictatorship and the emerging Islamist fundamentalist forces, particularly Salafists, which have for long been far better organized and fueled with an entrenched regional infrastructure against which they cannot compete without the support of the free world.

2. We hope and pray that the United Nations facilitate the expansion of programs and engagement with those organizations which share our ideals of liberal democracy including reformers, women, and minorities.

3.  As the Arab Awakening evolves, each nation finds itself in a once-in-a-generation or even millennium tipping point for simply the chance at genuine modern reform and change. It is our hope that you can help us give the democracy forces in civil society on the ground in each nation a chance to get their campaigns for freedom and liberty heard among the citizenry. Without the U.N. on their side they will not be heard. Egypt, Tunisia and especially Syria are each proving that in their own very unique way. We are certainly dedicated to these nations having the right to self-determination. But it is that very right to self-determination of the majority and the minorities of their citizenry on the ground which brings us to you. We come together to ask you to help us protect the right to self-determination of liberal groups, women’s groups, minorities, and secularists to name a few. Egypt for example, is evolving into a state controlled by fundamentalists which is a far cry from a liberal democracy. The voices of the genuine liberals in civil society are being drowned out on the ground between the old guard of secular fascists and the rising tide of authoritarian Islamists. We hope to help the UN acknowledge the presence of other new choices for moderation beyond the old ones of autocracy.

We all thank you for the attention of your team to the concerns of our organizations and expatriate constituencies.

Respectfully submitted,

Dr M. Zuhdi Jasser, President Save Syria Now and the American Islamic Forum for Democracy (Arizona)

Sherkoh Abbas, Chairman, Kurdish National Assembly of Syria (Michigan)

Robert Ozgun, Representative Syriac National Council (N.Y.)

Dr Adel Kobeish, Chairman, Voice of Egypt NGO (DC)

Mukhtar Kamel, Executive Director, President of the Egyptian American Alliance.(VA)

Dr Essam Abdallah, Egyptian Liberals (VA)

Sheikh Sami Khoury, former Consul General of Lebanon in Ecuador, former President of the World Lebanese Cultural Union (WLCM) and President of the World Maronite Union

Eblan Farris, Communications Director, World Council of the Cedars Revolution (D.C.)

Sana Karray Hababou, coordinator Tunisia Democracy NGOs, New York area

Tom Harb, Co-Chair, Middle East Americans Coalition for Democracy

The delegation is accompanied by our academic and legislative relations advisor, Professor Walid Phares (D.C.)

####

Obama’s Paralysis reveals failure of a Moral policy in Syria and a Post-American World

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Statement

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

 

MEDIA CONTACTS:      Gregg Edgar

Gordon C. James Public Relations

gedgar@gcjpr.com

602-690-7977

Obama’s Paralysis reveals failure of a Moral policy in Syria and a Post-American World

80,000 dead is not enough of a redline?

 PHOENIX (April 30, 2013) – Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, an American Muslim of Syrian descent and author of “A Battle for the Soul of Islam: An American Muslim Patriot’s Fight to Save His Faith” issued the following statement on behalf of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) regarding Syria:

“President Obama’s April 30 press conference revealed how we risk a world shaped in the absence of American advocacy for liberty. The ongoing genocide by the Assad regime in Syria has left the Syrian people with no hope or means for defense. After 26 months of bloodshed, the population, faced with complete decimation, is becoming more radicalized as well as exploited by foreign jihadists and militant Islamists. Our Commander-in-chief has failed moral test in both his tenor and lack of resolve in the face of genocide in Syria. Syrian expatriates and people of Syrian descent worldwide rushed to their media as the President called for a press conference – praying that this would be a sign of some hope for the beleaguered people of Syria. Instead, the President continued to dance all over the “bloodied” red line, making a mockery of those who actually look to the U.S. for leadership in the face of evil.

Are 80,000 deaths not enough of a “red line”? Tuesday’s press conference introduced no new ideas or policies on Syria, and instead proved to Assad’s monsters that the massacres can continue while the leaders of the free world do nothing.  The President did pay lip service to ending the reign of Bashar Assad, but his mythical red line and apparent “Paralysis Doctrine” showed the administration for the paper tiger it has turned out to be.

What the President does not realize is that Bashar Assad is not afraid to take action against his people He knows that he can continue shelling civilian neighborhoods, using all the weapons in his arsenal – while his shabiha military terror squads roam the neighborhoods murdering, torturing, and raping innocents. The President’s moral relativism on chemical weapons allowed tens of thousands to die with no response from the United States.  His equivocation on the meaning of a “red line” and continued lack of action to support those longing for freedom means the death of thousands more Syrians.

As the son of expatriates from Aleppo, Syria, I have watched with a deeply personal and almost helpless horror as almost 80,000 Syrians – our families from Aleppo to Dara’a, Damascus, Hama and Homs and beyond – have been massacred in a bloodbath the world watches passively. What I also know, however, is that this genocidal slaughter follows 48 excruciating years of Ba’athist oppression, murder, and torture to which few have paid any attention.

What started in Dara’a in March of 2011 was simply an awakening from a now festering cancer of fifty years. Ask any Syrian family who are not part of the Assad regime’s intelligence services, and they will tell you that like the Nazis, no sane human being ever envisaged Assad’s Ba’athist generals and massive murdering machine leaving through any route but by sheer force. Like Saddam Hussein, the Assad dynasty is cut from a cloth that seeks brutal final solutions, caving not to armchair political solutions but only to an overwhelming opposition.

President Obama’s inaction seems to be moving closer to  heeding the advice laid out in a recent article by conservative Dr. Daniel Pipes, which made  a shocking proposition: that in order to protect American interests, we should now aid Assad as a way to prevent a “worse” alternative from rising out of the rubble of revolution. Stated with trepidation, written with pause or not – this proposal approaches the Syrian people the way the notorious Dr. Kevorkian approached his “patients.” It quietly and inhumanly places a pillow over the faces of Syrians. If they die, no matter how painfully now – it is somehow more practical or even compassionate as if by order of God? They will then be quieter and bring the world less harm, cost, and general nuisance.

The truth is that no one can be sure where Syria is headed. The Syrian people will not give up no matter how hopeless as the taste of freedom is far preferable to any injustice the Assad regime may continue to bring their way. Is the rebellion well-organized? No. Might Islamists come next? Maybe. Even probably, especially considering Obama’s policies toward the Middle East and which Muslim nations are supporting the opposition (Qatar, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia). However, America cannot sacrifice our credibility with a twisted, rather bigoted logic that Syrians don’t deserve the possibility and the space to find liberty and freedom; but rather that they deserve only an assisted death to prevent the challenges that naturally arise from some fifty years of radicalism-fostering tyrannical dictatorship.

Bashar al-Assad and his generals have shown the world what Syrians have always known: Assad and his domestic allies will stop at nothing to stay in power. Beheadings, prolonged torture, mass rape, starvation and brutal executions reaching genocidal proportions are no surprise to those who have long witnessed the tyranny of Ba’athism in Syria. The courage of millions of Syrians has finally lifted the curtain on Assad’s reign of terror. The moral imperative to end the rule of Assad and the Syrian Baath party has never been clearer for the world to see. But will the global complicity and neglect finally end? And, if so, how much of Syria and its people will be left?

As with all revolutions, the fear of what will come next is a natural one. The rebels are weak, starving, penniless, homeless and maligned by a world that dismisses them due to the existence of a new force on the scene: the parasites of Jubhat al-Nusra (Al Qaeda), jihadists who have never met a war they didn’t like. Also, the concern about Muslim Brotherhood ascendancy is real but can only be defeated in a post-Assad environment. There is no doubt that should extremists rise to power, they must also be eradicated. The fact is that the longer the world leaves Syrians to die, the more self-fulfilling becomes the prophecy of a radicalized rebellion. However, Syrians will never forget that it took months of revolution before Islamists abandoned decades of close cooperation with Assad in exchange for the possibility of pursuing an Islamist state. Syrians will not forget that Hamas was headquartered in Damascus for decades, while Al-Qaeda used Assad’s Syria as a platform to attack Americans in Iraq and across the region. Syrians will not forget that the first casualties of Islamist violence are almost always Muslims themselves.

Syria’s people rose in peaceful demonstrations across the country in 2011, with only a handful representing a radical ideology. Now, that number is in the thousands – yet, this number of opportunistic vermin pales in comparison to the millions of regular Syrians in the rebellion. Unfortunately, without the robust assistance of Western democracies, Islamist states like Qatar, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia have been able to decide who gets aid and weaponry.

I embraced neo-conservatism in the 1990s because I believed it brought to the fore the ideas my grandfather and parents escaped Syria to embrace: promoting liberty and freedom abroad. While my family adored America, they saw our Cold War policies of aiding some criminal dictators to be amoral, anti-American abomination. We believed the new conservative movement set out to abandon the abysmal failure of Cold War policies and advance across the board a more robust intellectually consistent American idea of liberty. Watching both the right and left each develop their own brand of post-American passivity in the face of such obvious evil begs the question: has our foundational American commitment to the advancement of freedom vanished? Claiming to promote American interests by giving fascist Arab dictators the support they need to continue tilling the soil of radical Islamism effectively mimics the behaviors of actors like Russia, Iran and China. These are our competitors – not our allies – in the war of ideas between individual freedom and the death of it.

No matter how a policy of passivity – or worse, aiding dictators – is spun, American negligence on Syria remains immoral, un-American, and against our interests. The President has already burned 26 months in a pathetic exercise of hand-wringing, leaving an opening for our Islamist antagonists in Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Turkey to step in. The right is similarly paralyzed, but for different reasons. For the most part unfortunately, they see the Arab awakening only through a lens of Islamist ascendancy and nothing more. Lost on them entirely is the idea that America should be seeking out and supporting those on the ground who are rising against both secular, fascist dictatorship and Islamist tyranny in order to forge a third path of liberty and individual rights. If the President is in search of a Doctrine, that would be a “Liberty Doctrine.”

Who are we as a nation if we no longer defend and stand for our allies in liberty even when the odds are against them? Such a surrender to tyranny is not American. It is, in fact, not our history. Abraham Lincoln once exclaimed that, “America was the last best hope for mankind.” Mankind: not just those within our borders. As leaders of the free world, our actions and inaction both at home and abroad define our character, morality, courage, and integrity. Sentencing Syrians or any other people to the assisted suicide of “letting them kill each other” is an idea so repugnant, so short-sighted and immoral I simply cannot subscribe to it – regardless of how sensitive I may be with my own extended family in Syria in the line of fire.

I still believe, and indeed have dedicated my life to advancing the spirit of true American liberty and freedom especially within Muslim communities. Our liberties were and are not ever easily won. Our fear must not paralyze those of us living in the warmth of freedom from seeing the people of Syria as equally worthy of life and liberty regardless of how many obstacles arise in their path.”

 

About the American Islamic Forum for Democracy

The American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) charitable organization. AIFD’s mission advocates for the preservation of the founding principles of the United States Constitution, liberty and freedom, through the separation of mosque and state. For more information on AIFD, please visit our website at http://www.aifdemocracy.org/.

 

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Moderate Muslims Must Oppose Islamism

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By M. Zuhdi Jasser

National Review Online, 04/20/13

The terror attacks in Boston, perpetrated by the Tsarnaev brothers, have finally come to an end with the capture of the younger brother Dzhoakhar in Watertown on Friday evening. One hopes that Dzhoakhar survives just long enough to tell us whether he was working with any foreign or domestic Islamist groups before he hopefully meets the same fate of his victims. Our nation will certainly be resilient, and we cannot let terrorists achieve their goals of unraveling our society.

Perhaps Boston’s terror may finally be the impetus to begin the long overdue process of retooling America’s current counterterrorism strategies. Since 9-11, except for the Fort Hood massacre, we have been fortunate enough to avoid the kind of devastation and loss of life that we saw this week in Boston. That was certainly not for a lack of trying by our enemies, with over 300 arrests on terrorism charges since 9-11. Of these, over 80 percent were Islamists. I’ve said it before — after 9-11, after Fort Hood, and after Times Square, this is a Muslim problem that needs a Muslim solution.

The Tsarnaev brothers prove that the current Homeland Security “whack-a-mole” strategy is severely limited and rather flawed. The United States must address head-on the ideology of political Islam, which is the root cause of Islamist terrorism.

As details emerge about the identity and ideologies of the Tsarnaev brothers, it should quickly become clear that these individuals did not go to sleep one night normal American Muslims and wake up the next day al-Qaeda jihadists putting together pressure-cooker bombs. Their pathway towards radicalization will now be obvious to those who honestly connect the dots in retrospect. Far more important now is that leading reform-minded American Muslims, along with the U.S. government, the media, and academe, begin to confront and dissect the early stages of radicalization (Islamism), not just the last one (violent extremism).

Despite our devotion to our faith, I and other leading anti-Islamist Muslims were vilified by Muslim Brotherhood legacy groups in America, along with their choir on the left, for participating in Representative Peter King’s (R., N.Y.) hearing in Congress on American Muslim radicalization and the central role of Islamism. I believe history will show Chairman King’s hearings to be prescient. I was alsovilified by those same groups for my role in narrating the documentary The Third Jihad, which happened to open with an illustrative scene from the terror in Beslan, Russia, in September 2004, when militant Chechnyan Islamists killed 334 civilians, 186 of them children, after a two-week standoff. The 2008 documentary was about the threat of militant Islamism to the West and the need for anti-Islamist Muslims to counter that threat. How many attacks like that suffered by the people of Boston this week must we see before we recognize the need to drill down against the separatism of the global movement of political Islam and their dreams of an Islamic state?

Though these two brothers may have acted like regular American youth to unsuspecting neighbors, participating in sports, attending public schools, and hailing from neighborhoods in the Boston community, at some point they were taken in by the ideology of political Islam, which, like an intoxicating drug, lured them down the path of separatist Islamism and its common endpoint of militant jihadism against both non-Islamist Muslims and non-Muslim societies.

 

We at the American Islamic Forum for Democracyhope that our nation can begin to awaken from the anesthetic belief that we are simply fighting the nebulous threat of “violent extremism” to the fundamental realization that we need to counter early on the identifiable infection of Islamism that penetrates the mind of susceptible Muslim youth.

The struggle between western and Islamist ideologies rips to the core of a young Muslim’s identity. This is what I confront head on in my book A Battle for the Soul of Islam: An American Muslim Patriot’s Fight to Save His Faith. Our nation must develop a robust “liberty doctrine” that acknowledges this battle both at home and abroad. Since the FBI actually interviewed Tamerlan Tsarnaev in 2011, it will also be important to unravel in this case how the administration determines who actually poses an ideological risk for radicalization. As our diverseAmerican Islamic Leadership Coalition (AILC) of anti-Islamist Muslim organizations in North America wrote in 2011, to date the administration has been unwilling to even recognize that there is an identifiable ideological threat. Instead its strategy relies on the meaningless phrase “violent extremism,” or, in the case of Major Nidal Hasan’s Fort Hood massacre, “workplace violence.”

While these brothers were immigrants from Chechnya, they were not recent immigrants. It appears from their YouTube and Facebook pages that their Islamism was nurtured in just the past few years, after they had been in the U.S. for some time. So their radicalization was likely less about Chechnya than it was about the transnational Islamist supremacism that they brought with them. Tamerlan’s trip to Russia may ultimately reveal some indoctrination or training. Most likely, as we see the clues so far, is that they became obsessed with “Muslim victimhood” and became estranged from the America they had embraced to only fill that vacuum with militant Islamist hatred and supremacism.

This supremacism often originates from Saudi Arabia’s Wahhabi or Salafist ideologues, now positioned around the world and in social media. Tamerlan Tsarnaev, for example, had lauded the radical sermons of Feiz Muhammad out of Australia. On his Facebook page he described his own world view as “Islam,” which is synonymous with the Islamist desire to create theocratic Islamic states and a global neo-Caliphate. This is also code for the ultimate defeat of non-Islamic-majority nations by the ascent of Islamist states.

To jihadists, terror is a tool against societies that they dehumanize in order to disrupt their harmony and economy. Through terrorism, they can also make the West less comfortable or attractive for liberal Muslims, making it much easier for them to win this battle within the House of Islam. Their narrative is not new. Brothers like this, despite outward appearances of being “normal Americans,” never actually bought into the idea of Americanism and a truly pluralist society. We’ve seen it before in Faisal Shahzad, the Times Square bomber, and so many of the other radicalized jihadists found since 9-11 on our soil.

Even in Boston itself, a quick look at various competing Muslim and non-Muslim narratives finds the arrest and conviction of Tarek Mahenna — a recent, important teachable moment. In April 2012 the MIT graduate and pharmacist received more than 17 years in prison for aiding al-Qaeda. His arrest, trial, and conviction were reviled by the left and Islamist groups alike including the bizarre New York Times op-ed “A Dangerous Mind?” Just see theFreeTarek.com website for a virtual clinic into how the soil of Muslim victimization is tilled.

An obsessive mindset of “Muslims as victims” rather than as Americans is how many of these radical Islamists start. Put another way, Muslims are indoctrinated by many Muslim Brotherhood legacy groups and the like in the West to sympathize with the grievances and supremacist identity of the transnational theo-political movements of political Islam. Notice the brothers’ aunt and parents in Canada and Russia, who were brimming to the media with conspiracy theories and excuses. But then, as many point out, the Islamists of Chechnya have been fueled for decades by radicalization from salafi and Wahhabi ideas brought in by Saudi masters. Russia’s authoritarian and repressive response to entire swaths of Muslims in Chechnya certainly didn’t help empower moderate Muslims to defeat the radicals.

In A Battle for the Soul of Islam I dissect how my own patriotic upbringing in the Midwest, as the son of Syrian expatriates, taught me that I could practice my faith more freely in America than any where else in the world. I was raised with the sense that my primary allegiance was always to America and its fabric of Americanism, which can be realized only through a rejection of “Islamism” and its ideology. The idea of liberty must be nurtured within the Muslim consciousness in order to inoculate youth against the ideology of Islamism. This requires Muslim leaders who both believe in the separation of mosque and state and reject the “Islamic state.”

Until most Muslims begin to harness our resources and our efforts to counter the ideology of Islamism and its attraction of vulnerable American Muslim youth and its pathway towards jihadization, we will continue to see youth ages 13 and up turn against us. The “morphine” of jihadism numbs their identity and drives them to destroy free societies. It infects them, dehumanizes their fellow Americans, and instructs them to commit acts of terrorism against their own — Muslim and non-Muslim alike.

As is often the case with Islamists, their radicalization is preceded by misogyny and a learned behavior that dehumanizes women and then all those who seek to be free. Tamerlan Tsarnaev was arrested in 2009 for assault and battery against his girlfriend.

The warning signs in these two youths were obvious. But as a society that refuses to engage Islamism, we ignored them at our own peril.

— M. Zuhdi Jasser is the author of A Battle for the Soul of Islam: An American Muslim Patriot’s Fight to Save His Faith and president of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, based in Phoenix, Ariz. Follow him on Twitter @DrZuhdiJasser

 

Boston Bombers are yet another wake-up call for a national strategy against the root cause of Islamist terror

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Statement

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Boston Bombers are yet another wake-up call for a national strategy against the root cause of Islamist terror

Department of Homeland Security whack-a-mole program against “Violent Extremism” failed the American public

 

PHOENIX (April 19, 2013) – Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, a devout Muslim and author of “A Battle for the Soul of Islam: An American Muslim Patriot’s Fight to Save His Faith” issued the following statement on behalf of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) regarding the ongoing terror incident in Boston:

“The terror attacks in Boston, perpetrated by the Tsarnaev brothers have finally come to an end with the surrender of the younger brother Dzhoakhar in Watertown, MA Friday evening. But perhaps it will finally be the beginning of the long overdue process to retool America’s current counterterrorism strategies.  Since 9-11, we have been fortunate up until this attack to avoid the kind of devastation and loss of life that we saw in Boston, but that was not for a lack of trying by our enemies.

The Tsarnaev brothers prove that the current whack-a-mole strategy is severely limited and flawed and that it is time for the United States to address head on the ideology of political Islam which is the root cause of Islamist terrorism.

It appears from their YouTube and Facebook pages that the brothers Islamism was nurtured in just the past few years after they had been in the U.S. for some time. So their radicalization seemed to be less about Chechnya as it was about the transnational Islamist supremacism that infected their mind, was brought with them and nurtured in the end on our soil.

Since the FBI interviewed Tamerlan Tsarnaev in 2011, it will be important to unravel how the administration determines who actually poses an ideological risk for radicalization. To date the administration has been unwilling to even recognize that there is an ideological threat and instead calls it the meaningless “violent extremism” or in the case of Major Nidal Hasan’s Fort Hood massacre “workplace violence”.

AIFD calls upon American Muslims, the Obama Administration, media and academe to develop a coherent strategy to promote western ideals of liberty among Muslims domestically and abroad, while seeking to defeat the supremacist mindset of political Islam and its continued threat to our national security.”

 

 

About the American Islamic Forum for Democracy

The American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) charitable organization. AIFD’s mission advocates for the preservation of the founding principles of the United States Constitution, liberty and freedom, through the separation of mosque and state. For more information on AIFD, please visit our website at http://www.aifdemocracy.org/.

 

MEDIA CONTACTS:         Gregg Edgar

Gordon C. James Public Relations

gedgar@gcjpr.com

602-690-7977

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American Muslims revile Boston Marathon terror attack

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Statement

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

American Muslims revile Boston Marathon terror attack

AIFD thoughts and prayers are with the people of Boston after senseless attack

 

PHOENIX (April 16, 2013) – Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, a devout Muslim and author of “A Battle for the Soul of Islam: An American Muslim Patriot’s Fight to Save His Faith” issued the following statement on behalf of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) on the horrific attack on Boston, MA.

“The American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) sends it heartfelt condolences to the victims of the horrific attack on the City of Boston.  Incidents like this remind us of the need to be constantly vigilant in the protection of this great country and all of our people.

There is evil in this world and we must be prepared to fight against it in all of its forms.  The trauma and death of the innocent including the death of a young eight year old boy are a stark reminder of this fact. We are reminded of how vulnerable we all our as we struggle to maintain normalcy in our free and open democracy. But we also can find solace in the resiliency of the American people.

While it is early in this investigation, we pray for our law enforcement officials to be able to swiftly find the culprits of this heinous act and bring them all to justice.

Terror in all of its forms is a symptom of a much greater ideological battle and we will not eliminate these incidents until we take the battle to the enemy and destroy their ideological position”

About the American Islamic Forum for Democracy

The American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) charitable organization. AIFD’s mission advocates for the preservation of the founding principles of the United States Constitution, liberty and freedom, through the separation of mosque and state. For more information on AIFD, please visit our website at http://www.aifdemocracy.org/.

 

MEDIA CONTACTS:         Gregg Edgar

Gordon C. James Public Relations

gedgar@gcjpr.com

602-690-7977