Washington Post goes slack over Islamic Society of N. America
The Washington Post, covering an interfaith religious service, took “diversity” at face value (“3 faiths, 1 message of respect; A service at Washington National Cathedral featuring readings by Christian, Jewish and Muslim clergy is part of a project among U.S. houses of worship to promote religious tolerance,” June 27).
One of the participants featured was Imam Mohamed Magid, identified as “president of the Islamic Society of North America.” Imam Magid, The Post reported, “chanted a passage from the Koran about the value of diversity.”
In a 2004 talk at Georgetown University, Imam Magid rejected descriptions of the Islamist Sudanese government’s campaign in rebellious Darfur region as genocide. The imam also claimed the number of victims had been greatly exaggerated. In 2005, the U.N.’s International Criminal Court indicted Sudan’s ruler, Omar Hassan al-Bashir, for directing genocide in Darfur.
ISNA has ties to Egypt’s fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood, which The Post does not mention. Neither does it report that a member of the society’s board of directors, Jamal Badawi, was listed as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Justice Department’s successful 2009 prosecution of the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development. HLF leaders were found guilty of raising millions of dollars for Hamas, (the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement), designated a terrorist organization by the U.S. government.
A speaker at ISNA’s annual convention in 2009 was Imam Warith Deen. Imam Deen has said of the Holocaust that “Jews were being punished for being serially disobedient to Allah.”
News reporting often can do no more than sketch the identities of those being covered. Still, even sketches ought to include relevant background. (From an unpublished CAMERA letter to the editor at The Post.)
More from SNAPSHOTS
Mahmoud Abbas’ Diatribe Threatening Israel Included Bogus Canaanite Claim
September 10, 2019
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’ recent anti-Israel diatribe that aired on PA TV was monitored and translated by Palestinian Media Watch (PMW). Excerpt: "I say to [Israel]: Every stone you have built on our land [...]
CNN Calls House’s Unifying Anti-BDS Vote ‘Divisive’
July 24, 2019
Yesterday, in an overwhelming vote of bipartisan support, the House of Representatives voted 398 to 17 to adopt a resolution opposing the anti-Israel BDS (boycott, divest, sanctions) campaign. Yet, CNN's headline casts the unifying vote [...]
NY Times Cites Poll, Hides Palestinian Support for Violence
July 9, 2019
The New York Times has struggled to accurately describe polls this year. In January, editor Jonathan Weisman misrepresented Pew polling data to describe a nonexistent surge in Israeli support for the United States under President [...]
CNN’s Zakaria Indulges Palestinian Propagandist Hanan Ashrawi
June 9, 2019
Fareed Zakaria’s weekly Cable News Network (CNN) program (grandiosely named “Global Public Square”) June 9 broadcast included a discussion of the current U.S. Middle East peace plan with guests Hanan Ashrawi (Palestinian Authority official) and [...]
In Robert Bernstein Obit, AFP Inappropriately References His Judaism
May 29, 2019
Robert Bernstein (Courtesy the New Press) In its obituary yesterday for American publisher Robert Bernstein, Agence France Presse inserted an inappropriate reference to the Human Rights Watch founder who later turned on the organization due [...]