APPELLATE RULES KAUFMAN A JOURNALIST AND RULES THAT CASE HAS NO MERIT TO CONTINUE (Dallas, TX) The lawsuit and restraining order that were filed against the Chairman of Americans Against Hate (AAH) Joe Kaufman by seven Dallas-area Muslim organizations, in October 2007, were thrown out this past week by the State of Texas Court of Appeals, Second District of Texas Fort Worth.
The seven plaintiffs included the Muslim American Society (MAS), which the U.S. government has called a front for the extremist Muslim Brotherhood, and three Islamic centers owned by the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT), an organization that was named a co-conspirator in the 2007/2008 Holy Land Foundation (HLF) Hamas financing trial.
The groups claimed in the lawsuit that Kaufman had written an article for FrontPage Magazine that libeled them, yet not one of the groups was actually named in the article. It was about the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) and its connection to the financing of terrorism overseas. Kaufman, in October 2007, had flown to Texas to lead a demonstration outside an ICNA-sponsored event to expose this information to the public.
Regarding the restraining order or “temporary injunction,” the groups admitted under oath that neither Kaufman nor his group had ever threatened them in any way, shape or form. Indeed, with respect to this case, it was Kaufman and his organization that received a threat, before Kaufman’s arrival in Texas.
The case was placed in the Appellate, after the presiding judge refused to rule on whether or not Kaufman was a “media defendant” and refused to rule on the case (“summary judgment”) prior to it going to trial.
The Appellate dealt with both issues, stating that Kaufman was a “media defendant” and deserved all the rights provided to print journalists. And the Appellate moved to dismiss the case, on the grounds that the article written by Kaufman was not about and did not mention any of the plaintiffs or “appellees.” The Appellate basically agreed with everything that Kaufman and his attorneys were arguing and shot down the arguments from the losing side.
One of the more embarrassing arguments from the other side was that Joe Kaufman ran FrontPage Magazine. FrontPage, in reality, is run by the David Horowitz Freedom Center, and Kaufman is a columnist for it. Both Kaufman and David Horowitz wrote and filed affidavits attesting to this. The plaintiffs worked hard to have these affidavits thrown out.
From the start of the case, Kaufman has called the lawsuit “entirely frivolous” and stated that it was only brought to harm Kaufman financially and to stop him from writing about the terrorism ties of the plaintiffs’ friends. In the end, the case was an important victory for Freedom of Speech.
Joe Kaufman is available for interview. E-mail: info@americansagainsthate.org. Source: AAH
 By Jonathan Schanzer A California nonprofit dedicated to "teaching about Islam & Muslims" at U.S. high schools and college campuses features a board of advisors that is stacked with some of the most controversial activist professors in the field of Middle Eastern studies today. The imprimatur of these scholars may signal a troubling shift toward the support of proselytizing efforts and the further unraveling of Middle East Studies in America. The board of Islamic Networks Group (ING) is a veritable Who's Who of Islamist apologists and activists. Leading the list is John Esposito, the founding director of the Saudi-funded Center for Muslim Christian Understanding at Georgetown University. He famously stated that the suicide-bombing Hamas organization engages in "honey, cheese-making, and home-based clothing manufacture." Joining Esposito on the ING board is Sherman Jackson of the University of Michigan, who was a trustee at the North American Islamic Trust and worked with the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), both un-indicted co-conspirators in the U.S. v. Holy Land Foundation. Read more ...Source: The American Thinker
 ACLU Statement Regarding False Accusations Against Islamic Society Of North America (1/18/2009) "The American Civil Liberties Union represents the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and another mainstream Muslim organization, the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT), in an effort to clear their designations as "unindicted co-conspirators" by prosecutors in the Holy Land Foundation terrorism-financing case. Neither organization was the subject of a criminal investigation or charged with any crime.
Dr. Ingrid Mattson, the head of ISNA, is scheduled to deliver a prayer at the Obama inauguration ceremonies." Read more ... Source: ACLU H/T: Weasel Zippers
 DALLAS – After two days of background, prosecutors in the Hamas-support trial against five former officials at the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF) got to the heart of their case Thursday, presenting evidence that the charity was the fundraising arm of a vast Muslim Brotherhood plan to help Hamas and to infiltrate the United States. In doing so, they showed how two active national organizations, the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and its parent, the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT) were both tied to the Muslim Brotherhood and to HLF. The Brotherhood is an 80-year-old Egyptian religious and political movement that seeks to instill Sharia, or Islamic law, as the controlling basis for society throughout the world. In court papers filed in July, prosecutors spelled out ISNA's and NAIT's connections to the case: "During the early years of the HLF's operations HLF raised money and supported HAMAS through a bank account it held with ISNA and NAIT," prosecutors wrote earlier this summer. "ISNA checks deposited into the ISNA/NAIT account for the HLF were often made payable to "the Palestinian Mujahideen," the original name for the HAMAS military wing. From that ISNA/NAIT account, the HLF sent hundreds of thousands of dollars to HAMAS leader Mousa Abu Marzook; Nadia Elashi (defendant Ghassan Elashi's cousin and Marzook's wife), Sheikh Ahmed Yassin's Islamic Center of Gaza, the Islamic University, and a number of other individuals associated with HAMAS." In court Thursday, FBI Agent Lara Burns pointed to translated bank records showing a letter written in Arabic requesting payments to defendant Ghassan Elashi and Shukri Abu Baker. Read more ...Source: IPT News
 By Joe Kaufman During the 1990s, the Hamas infrastructure within the United States was complete. It consisted of a propagation outlet, the Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP); a financing wing, the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF); a command center, the United Association for Studies and Research (UASR); and a defense mechanism, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). Today, only the latter exists, along with a remnant of the IAP, the Mosque Foundation. Both have a presence in the Chicago area, where group and mosque are working hard to indoctrinate young Muslims into radical Islam. In 1981, two Muslim Brotherhood entities, which later would be widely regarded as being aligned with the terrorist Hamas, were established within the Chicago area of Illinois. One, the IAP, was created as a collaboratory effort between future Hamas leader Mousa Abu Marzook and future Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Sami Al-Arian. Soon after the onset of the violent Palestinian Intifada against Israel, which began in 1987 and which gave birth to Hamas, the IAP became a publishing house for the Hamas charter and Hamas terror training videos. The other entity that was created in ’81 was the Mosque Foundation (MF), also known as the Bridgeview Mosque. The center was actually founded 30 years earlier, but in 1981, MF’s original leaders were ousted, as the property was taken over by the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT). NAIT, an extremist Muslim Brotherhood offshoot, was recently named by the U.S. government as a co-conspirator for a federal trial dealing with the financing of millions of dollars to Hamas. Read more ...Source: FrontPage Magazine
By Michael Bates On Wednesday, July 23, District Judge Linda Morrissey denied motions by the Islamic Society of Tulsa, Mujib Cheema, and the North American Islamic Trust to dismiss Jamal Miftah's lawsuit against them. Miftah is suing Cheema, IST, and NAIT, as well as several other individual leaders in IST for assault and battery, defamation, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Earlier this year, Judge Gordon McAllister granted several motions to dismiss, but gave Miftah's attorneys 20 days to present an amended petition. It was this amended petition that was the subject of the latest motions to dismiss, which were denied. We will keep you posted on developments. Here is a link to BatesLine's Jamal Miftah category, where you can catch up on the dispute between Miftah and IST regarding IST expelling him over his op-ed condemning terrorism in the name of Islam. Read more ...Source: BatesLineH/T: Cao's BlogJamal Miftah
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 In its latest filing before the federal district court in Dallas on behalf of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and its affiliate organization, the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT) in the Hamas-terrorism financing case, the ACLU has made a noteworthy admission. Rather than deny that there is copious evidence tying ISNA and NAIT to Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood, the brief argues that such evidence is merely dated. In a curious footnote on page 7, the reply states: Assuming the authenticity of documents' dates, the most recent documents to mention either ISNA or NAIT are dated 1991, Gov. Exhs. 3-3 and 3-85, but the majority of the documents are older. Almost all of the numerous exhibits that purport to show financial transactions and that contain any mention of ISNA or NAIT are dated 1988 and 1989 (there are two dated 1990), almost a decade before the majority of the overt acts the government alleges in support of its conspiracy charges against the HLF defendants. Read more ... Source: IPT News
 By Steven Emerson The Islamic Society of North America's (ISNA) roots in the Muslim Brotherhood have been strengthened by newly declassified FBI memos and from a second, highly unlikely source. The records, recently obtained by the Investigative Project on Terrorism through Freedom of Information Act requests, show that FBI agents investigated a parent organization to ISNA, the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT), during the mid 1980s. The FBI investigation concluded that the Muslim Brotherhood members who founded U.S.-based groups had risen to "leadership roles within NAIT and its related organizations," including ISNA, "which means they are in a position to direct the activities and support of Muslims in the U.S. for the Islamic Revolution." The FBI memo also said that: Within the organizational structure of NAIT, there have been numerous groups and individuals identified as being a part of a covert network of revolutionaries who have clearly indicated there (sic) support for the Islamic Revolution as advocated by the AYATOLLAH KHOMEINI and his government as well as other fanatical Islamic Shiite fundamentalist leaders in the Middle East. This faction of Muslims have declared war on the United States, Israel and any other country they deem as an enemy of Islam. The common bond between these various organizations is both religious and political with the underlying common goal being to further the holy war (Islamic Jihad). Read more ... Source: IPT News
 Win or lose, efforts by two Islamist groups to purge their names from a list of unindicted co-conspirators in a Hamas-support trial have proven counter-productive. The Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and its related financial arm the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT) were named among eight "individuals/entities who are and/or were members of the US Muslim Brotherhood," in court papers filed in May 2007. Prosecutors say the groups were part of a broad scheme to support Hamas financially and politically. The Texas-based Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF) was at the heart of that scheme. It and five former officials face a retrial Sept. 8 on charges they conspired to provide material support to Hamas. With that looming, ISNA and NAIT petitioned U.S. District Judge Jorge A. Solis in June, demanding they be struck from the list. It is one thing to persuade gullible politicians and journalists that their established roots in the Muslim Brotherhood either don't exist or don't matter. But to argue in court does nothing but beg a pointed and damaging response. Their brief, filed on their behalf by the American Civil Liberties Union, argued that inclusion among groups and people who belonged to the Muslim Brotherhood in America improperly labeled them without a chance to defend themselves. This, they claim, is harming their reputations with government agencies and other religious organizations. Read more ...Source: IPT News
  By Josh Gerstein Federal prosecutors are stridently rejecting claims that two prominent Muslim organizations were unfairly named as unindicted co-conspirators in the prosecution of a Texas-based charity accused of acting as a front group for Hamas. In a filing yesterday in federal court in Dallas, prosecutors said the Islamic Society of North America and the North American Islamic Trust suffered no lasting harm by being included on the co-conspirator list prosecutors filed prior to the trial last year of the Holy Land Foundation and five of its officers because evidence supporting the claim became public just weeks later. "During last year's trial, numerous exhibits were entered into evidence establishing both ISNA's and NAIT's intimate relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood, the Palestine Committee, and the defendants in this case," the prosecutors wrote. "They were intimately connected with the HLF and its assigned task of providing financial support to HAMAS. ... That ISNA and NAIT appeared in these documents and share a common history with these defendants is a reflection of the evidence, not any attempt to 'disparage' or 'vilify.'" Read more ...Source: The New York Sun
 By Joe Kaufman The Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and its sister org, the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT), are attempting to have their names taken off the U.S. government’s list of “unindicted co-conspirators” for a Dallas Hamas fundraising trial that began almost one year ago. They are claiming that, because of the designation, the government has done harm to their relationship with law enforcement and interfaith groups. The following will show that the designation was a proper one and that, if any damage has been done to the groups’ relationships with others, they have only themselves to blame. On June 18, 2008, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a legal challenge on behalf of ISNA and NAIT, stating that the two groups had been wronged when the U.S. government labeled them as “unindicted co-conspirators” for the 2007 trial which named leaders of the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF) as defendants. HLF, the former American Hamas financing wing, was founded in 1987 by Hamas operative Mousa Abu Marzook. According to the ACLU, “the government’s action... has caused each organization’s reputation and good name to be dragged through the mud,” and the government has the “obligation to correct the record and clear” their names. Read more ...Source: FrontPage Magazine
 The Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT) want a Dallas federal judge to remove their names from a list of "unindicted co-conspirators and/or joint venturers" in the terror support trial of a charity accused of supporting Hamas. The petition filed by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of NAIT and ISNA states that the designation violates Fifth Amendment protections by casting a smear on the organizations without proof, and without the opportunity for a defense. This, they claim, has deeply tarnished the groups' reputations with government agencies and other religious organizations. But in making their case, the two groups ignore documented evidence that links them to the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF) and to their support for Hamas leader Mousa Abu Marzook. They insist they are law-abiding organizations and say law enforcement officials have assured them they are not the target of any investigation. HLF and five of its former officials face a retrial in September on charge they conspired to provide material support to Hamas. A mistrial was declared in October after jurors could not reach unanimous decisions on most counts. An investigation by the Investigative Project on Terrorism found several jurors felt bullied when they argued for convictions. Read more ...Source: IPT News
The Muslim Brotherhood "must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and 'sabotaging' its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and Allah's religion is made victorious over all other religions." That's from " An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Brotherhood in North America," a 1991 presentation by Muslim Brotherhood operative Mohamed Akram. The Brotherhood memorandum concludes with "a list of our organizations and the organizations of our friends." Among these organizations are the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT), the groups that the ACLU is here characterizing as "mainstream Muslim organizations." I have no doubt that they are mainstream. But I would hope that the relevant authorities do not rule on this case without discussing the Brotherhood memorandum in some detail. Read more ...Source: Jihad WatchACLU
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