CAIR and Cal

While the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has been busy attacking syndicated columnist Cal Thomas recently for supposedly "Islamophobic" comments, the media-hungry group did not condemn the foiled terrorist plots in London or the successful one in Glasgow, Scotland.

Though CAIR's Web site has a video clip of the Chicago chapter director lamenting the events in Britain and the group helped coordinate a St. Louis press conference of Muslim doctors who spoke out against the terrorists, CAIR itself did not condemn the actions of the Islamic terrorists in Britain.

Given that CAIR played a role in promoting its Chicago director and the Muslim doctors, some might wish to give the benefit of the doubt. The organization's history, however, shows that this artful dodge is simply part of its modus operandi.

CAIR has mastered the art of appearing to oppose terrorism, while at the same time leading the charge against those who seek to thwart it.

A case in point is its curiously neglecting to condemn Britain's Islamic terrorists, while during the same week blasting as "Islamophobic" Mr. Thomas' remarks on local radio station WTOP expressing concern about fundamentalists from the "Middle East and South Asia" who are integrating into the broader Muslim society.

In a story for WTOPnews.com, WTOP quoted CAIR spokesman Ibrahim Hooper claiming, "We condemn extremism. We've condemned terrorism... We've issued dozens of condemnations on dozens of terrorism attacks."

CAIR has, in fact, condemned what it considers to be extremism and terrorism — when targeted at Muslims. If a Muslim is the victim of a possible hate crime or has been subjected to a religious slur, CAIR is there. There is nothing wrong with that, of course. And the group is well within its rights when it routinely rails against the United States and Israel.

What CAIR does not do, though, is denounce Islamic fundamentalists who promote a paranoid worldview in which America and Israel are the enemies of Islam, achieved by manufacturing mythical massacres that whip their followers into a lather.