The Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM) joins the Israeli-American Civic Action Network (ICAN) in strongly supporting Florida House of Representatives’ Resolution 1209, which calls for the suspension of engagement with the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) by state executive agencies, law enforcement, and local governments.
HR 1209 — the full text of which can be read HERE — is a “bold step towards shielding our society from insidious extremist influences,” ICAN said in a statement published on Friday. “ICAN firmly stands with Florida in this prudent and necessary course of action.”
In late November, CAIR Executive Director Nihad Awad, declared that the October 7th Hamas attack against Israel was a source of “inspiration” and that he was “happy to see people breaking the siege and throwing down the shackles of their own land.”
Awad’s remarks delivered at an Americans for Muslims for Palestine (AMP) convention in Chicago, Illinois. A full recording was published by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI).
Combat Antisemitism Movement CEO Sacha Roytman said at the time, “As if any further evidence was needed, Nihad Awad’s praise of the worst act of violence targeting Jews since the Holocaust proves once and again that CAIR is a leading propagator of antisemitic incitement in the United States. I urge all government, media, and faith leaders to take note: CAIR’s agenda and values lie far outside the mainstream of American society, and it must be ostracized across the political and ideological spectrum as a dangerous extremist organization driven by hatred of Jews.”
Awad has a long and notorious track record of antisemitic rhetoric. In October 2014, for example, he claimed that the United States would only recognize a Palestinian state when “America, itself, is free from the influence of the pro-Israel lobby.”
Zahra Billoo, head of CAIR’s San Francisco Bay Area office, also gave a vociferously antisemitic address at an AMP convention in December 2021. In her speech, Billoo used bigoted and threatening rhetoric that typifies contemporary Islamist Jew-hatred.
Attacking American Jewish communal organizations, Billoo said, “When we talk about Islamophobia, we think oftentimes about the vehement fascists. But I also want us to pay attention to the polite Zionists. The ones that say, ‘Let’s just break bread together.’”
“We need to pay attention to the Anti-Defamation League,” she added. “We need to pay attention to the Jewish Federation. We need to pay attention to the Zionist synagogues. We need to pay attention to the Hillel chapters on our campuses, because just because they’re your friend today doesn’t mean that they have your back when it comes to human rights. So oppose the vehement fascists, but oppose the polite Zionists, too. They are not your friends.”
