Nicely done, CAIR.
Via IPT:
Officials at the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) have expressed astonishment and confusion over a decision by the United Arab Emirates to include the American-Islamist organization on a list of terrorist groups.
“Well this is shocking to us in the first place,” CAIR co-founder and Executive Director Nihad Awad told CNN Tuesday. “It’s a bizarre move by the UAE and that’s why we’re seeking clarification by this decision, not only CAIR but other civil Muslim organizations including Muslim American Society and the largest Islamic relief organization for Muslims in the West. So it is quite frightening and shocking that a state like the UAE would designate an American civil rights and advocacy organization like CAIR.”
The terrorist list was first reported by Buzzfeed on Saturday, which cited a UAE state media announcement.
One week earlier, a CAIR banquet in California bestowed its “Promoting Justice” award to Sami Al-Arian and his family. Al-Arian was on the Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s Shura Council – its board of directors – in the 1990s and provided refuge to at least three other board members in the United States, including current PIJ Secretary General Ramadan Shallah.
During a 1991 speech in Cleveland, Al-Arian was introduced as the head of a charity called the Islamic Committee for Palestine. “A brief note about the Islamic Committee for Palestine,” Imam Fawaz Damra explained to the audience. “It is the active arm of the Islamic Jihad Movement in Palestine. We preferred to call it the “Islamic Committee for Palestine” for security reasons.” […]
“The evidence was clear in this case that you were a leader of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad,” U.S. District Court Judge James Moody told Al-Arian during a 2006 sentencing hearing. “You were on the board of directors and an officer, the secretary. Directors control the actions of an organization, even the PIJ; and you were an active leader.”