ISNA Says Israel Responsible For Gaza Escalation

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The Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) has joined the Global Muslim Brotherhood is blaming Israel for the escalation in the Gaza conflict. The ISNA statement refers to “minor violations of the ceasefire throughout the last few months from both sides” but that “the use of airpower and heavy shelling by Israel has introduced a new level of dangerous uncertainty that is in need of much restraint.”:

(Washington, D.C/November 16, 2012) The Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) calls on President Obama and his Administration to demand that a cease fire in the Palestinian/Israeli conflict which was broken by a series of aerial bombings in the Gaza strip be immediately restored.  This action has since provoked violence on both sides, thus far claiming the lives of 19 Palestinians and 3 Israelis and injuring 188 Palestinians and 51 Israelis.  Our nation has a moral obligation to stop the violence and any and all violations of the ceasefire that brought relative peace in the area for the past 4 years.  ISNA continues to call all sides – Israeli and Palestinian – to cease violent actions and return to diplomacy to solve grievances.   News reports indicate that Israel may be preparing for a large ground incursion into the Gaza strip.

Read the rest here.

As documented in a Hudson Institute reportISNA grew directly out of the U.S. Muslim Brotherhood. Contrary to its claim that ISNA has a “long record of fighting hate, extremism, and bigotry, including anti-Semitism”, the organization actually has a long history of fundamentalism, anti-semitism, and support for terrorism and during the recent Holy Land Foundation terrorism financing trial, ISNA was named as an unindicted co-conspirator as a result of what the government called “ISNA’s and NAIT’s intimate relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood, the Palestine Committee, and the defendants in this case.” Although it is true that ISNA has issued condemnations of terrorism which for the first time identified Hamas and Hezbollah by name, there is no indication that the organization has ever addressed or acknowledged its history of support for terrorism. Also, as the Hudson Institute report observes, almost all of the ISNA founders remain active in the organization and ISNA maintains close relations with all other components of the U.S. Muslim Brotherhood.

A previous post discussed the ties between the ISNA Secretary-General, a former leader of the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) Chicago chapter, and an Illinois school with close links to the Mosque Foundation, itself tied to fundraising for Hamas. Despite it’s long history of association with fundamentalism, terrorism, and anti-Semitism, ISNA has been successful of late in building alliances with Jewish leaders and organizations. Former ISNA officials such as Muzammil Siddiqi, Sayyid Syeed, and Mohamed Magid have been particularly active in promoting Holocaust awareness, including participating in a trip last August to concentration camp sites in Europe. A post from October 2011 reported on a  controversial conference associated with ISNA that was accused by a critics of being sponsored by organizers who made of anti-Semitic and anti-gay remarks.

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