The November 27, 2014 Enquête TV report highlighted three articles published by Point de Bascule at the end of October 2014 on the inappropriate and dangerous collaboration between the Ottawa police and some Ottawa-based Islamist organizations. The three articles are displayed in the video of the November 27 episode of Enquête between 38:22 and 38:28.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PART 1 – Jean Pelletier claims that Point de Bascule did not provide “the hint of a shred of evidence” about the Islamist penetration of police services. His own TV program Enquête proves otherwise.
PART 2 – Hamas threatens to attack Ottawa and other capitals where Israeli embassies are located. However, after Cpl. Cirillo was murdered by a jihadist, Ottawa Police and the RCMP reacted by comforting those who finance its fund collector.
PART 3 – The National Council of Canadian Muslims (formerly CAIR-CAN) involved in the “training” of Ottawa Police officers in spite of the endorsement given to Hamas by some of its leaders
PART 4 – The Ottawa Police Service defended Islamist Tariq Ramadan in the UK after establishing a relationship with his organization Muslim Presence in 2001
PART 5 – Other cases of inappropriate collaboration between Canadian police services and Islamists were documented by Point de Bascule before the November 27 Enquête TV report
PART 6 – Experts are divided on the existence and the nature of the Islamist threat
PART 1 – Jean Pelletier claims that Point de Bascule did not provide “the hint of a shred of evidence” about the Islamist penetration of police services. His own TV program Enquête proves otherwise.
On December 17, 2014, Jean Pelletier, Radio-Canada’s Senior Director of information, condemned Point de Bascule and its director Marc Lebuis in a letter (PDF – HTML) sent to Lise Ravary, a Journal de Montréal columnist. Mr. Pelletier was responding to her criticism of the November 27, 2014 Radio-Canada’s Enquête TV report that denied the existence of an Islamist threat in Quebec.
Lise Ravary’s article was published by the Journal de Montréal (paper copy) on December 8, 2014. She also dedicated her December 10 blog to the same TV report.
Similar to the Enquête TV report (VIDEO of the program 41:16), Mr. Pelletier insinuates in the conclusion of his letter that Marc Lebuis and Point de Bascule ”yield to intolerance” by suggesting, without evidence, according to him, the existence of an Islamist penetration of police services.
Mr. Pelletier’s answer to Lise Ravary is announced on Radio-Canada’s website. It has also been publicized by the TV show host, Alain Gravel, the producer-coordinator, Claudine Blais, and Adil Charkaoui, on Twitter. The Association des Musulmans et des Arabes pour la Laïcité au Québec did the same on Facebook.
Mr. Pelletier wrote what follows about Point de Bascule to Lise Ravary:
[Translation PdeB] You [Ms. Ravary] believe in an organized and insidious threat, whose disciples “penetrate police services in Canada,” as Mr. Lebuis and his Point de bascule claims with wisdom in our TV report without bringing the hint of a shred of evidence.
[Original French] Vous [Madame Ravary] croyez en une menace sournoise, organisée, dont ses apôtres “pénètrent les services de police au Canada” comme le prétend de docte façon M. Lebuis et son Point de bascule dans notre reportage sans toutefois avancer l’ombre d’un soupçon de preuves.
Not “the hint of a shred of evidence.” Really?
Jean Pelletier’s remark may be attributed to the fact that when Enquête’s journalist Johanne Faucher asked Marc Lebuis to provide some examples of an Islamist penetration of police services IN QUEBEC, he answered that Point de Bascule required verification of some data prior to confirming CASES IN QUEBEC (VIDEO of Enquête 38:35). Marc Lebuis’s response did not mean, however, that Point de Bascule had not already documented cases of Islamist penetration or cases of dangerous collaboration between police and Islamists elsewhere in Canada.
During two meetings with Enquête’s journalist Johanne Faucher that preceded the September 2014 filmed interview, Marc Lebuis informed her about such cases but she was not interested in them and insisted on obtaining strictly Quebec-based cases.
If Mr. Pelletier would take the time to watch his own TV show Enquête, he would notice that three articles published by Point de Bascule at the end of October 2014 about the dangerous and inappropriate collaboration between the Ottawa police and local Islamist organizations were highlighted by his own production team. The excerpt can be found between 38:22 and 38:28 in the video of the November 27 episode of Enquête.
“The hint of a shred of evidence” of an Islamist penetration of police services is there.
Many other articles about the Islamist penetration of police services and government agencies dedicated to security were published by Point de Bascule before the broadcast of the November 27 episode of Enquête. Some of them are listed in section 5 of this article.
The three Point de Bascule articles highlighted by Enquête opposed the decision taken by the Ottawa Police Service and the RCMP to lend support and reassure Islamists linked to the Hamas infrastructure in Canada the very day Cpl. Nathan Cirillo was brutally murdered by a jihadist on Parliament Hill. The action by both police services in response to this terrorist attack at the heart of Canadian democracy gave the message that the real victims were not the assassinated Corporal, the members of his family, and all those Canadians who valued him, but rather the Islamists and their supporters who contribute to Hamas’ fund collector and enable it to pursue the same goal as that of the Islamic State that motivated Nathan Cirillo’s murderer.
Here are the links for all three articles featured by Enquête on November 27:
Point de Bascule (October 28, 2014): Ottawa Police Chief Bordeleau more worried about fictitious “backlash” against Muslim community than by promotion and funding of jihad coming from the Islamic organizations with which he is “building bridges”
Point de Bascule (October 30, 2014): “Bridge building” with Islamists – Rundown of the Muslim organizations met by the Ottawa Police Service and the RCMP in the hours following the murder of Cpl. Nathan Cirillo by a jihadist on Parliament Hill
Point de Bascule (October 30, 2014): VIDEO Point de Bascule Director and Brian Lilley about the Ottawa Police “building bridges” with Islamist terror funders in the hours that followed the brutal murder of Cpl. Cirillo by a jihadist on Parliament Hill
PART 2 – Hamas threatens to attack Ottawa and other capitals where Israeli embassies are located. However, after Cpl. Cirillo was murdered by a jihadist, Ottawa Police and the RCMP reacted by comforting those who finance its fund collector.
On July 16, 2013, Hamas threatened to launch terrorist attacks in countries where Israeli embassies are located. This includes Canada, of course, and Ottawa in particular. Aside from being engaged in the destruction of Israel, Hamas shares its goal of conquest with Al Qaeda, the Islamic State, and other Islamist organizations in the news. In recent years, Hamas leaders have frequently advocated the Islamic conquest of the West (2006 – 2008 – 2011 – 2012). In 2011, for example, Hamas leader Mahmoud Al-Zahhar pronounced on TV that Western civilization “will not be able to withstand the great and glorious Islam.”
Point de Bascule’s articles highlighted by Enquête’s TV report criticize Ottawa Police Chief Bordeleau’s decision of comforting many Ottawa-based Islamist organizations after the brutal murder of Cpl. Cirillo by a jihadist on October 22, 2014, in spite of the fact that they contributed to Hamas fund collector. That day, OPS and RCMP officers even met with the main Ottawa-based Islamist organizations’ leaders to express their support.
There was never any justification for Canadian police services to socialize, and even less reasons to embrace the advice of organizations linked to the Hamas infrastructure in Canada. This conclusion should have been even more obvious after Hamas threatened to attack Ottawa and other cities where Israeli embassies are located around the world.
In 2009, Hamas fund collector, IRFAN-Canada, and the Muslim Association of Canada (MAC), one of the organizations endorsed by the OPS and the RCMP the very day Cpl. Cirillo was brutally murdered, greeted Ekrima Sabri in Montreal for a fundraiser. In 2000, Sabri promoted suicide operations by stating: “The younger the martyr – the greater and the more I respect him.”
The year he visited Canada, Sabri was identified as an administrator of the Union of Good, an organization led by the Muslim Brotherhood’s spiritual guide Youssef Qaradawi that provides financial support to Hamas.
After the terrorist attacks in Toulouse at the end of March 2012, the French government banned Ekrima Sabri from entering its territory. He was scheduled to take part in a Muslim Brotherhood local front organization’s convention.
As long as individuals in position of authority in Canada, and in police services in particular, continue to give credibility to those who fund and organize the radicalization of Muslims in the country, it will be impossible to reduce the threat Canadians are facing.
Point de Bascule (December 1, 2014): IRFAN-Canada – Montreal’s La Presse publishes three articles about Hamas fund collector based on recently obtained RCMP documents [Article in French]
Some of the organizations met by OPS and RCMP officers on October 22, 2014 have also funded Human Concern International and Islamic Relief Canada. Both entities still have a charitable status with the Canada Revenue Agency, in spite of their sponsorship of many Islamist conventions featuring radicals, such as Qazi Hussein Ahmad, Pakistan’s Jamaat-e-Islami leader who was banned from entering Canada by the federal government in 2008.
Qazi Hussein Ahmad’s Jamaat-e-Islami was founded by Syed Maududi (1903-1979), one of the most respected ideologues of the Muslim Brotherhood infrastructure. In his book Jihad in Islam, Maududi expressed the objective pursued by his supporters as follows:
Islam wishes to destroy all States and Governments anywhere on the face of the earth which are opposed to the ideology and programme of Islam regardless of the country or the Nation that rules it. […] Islam requires the earth – not just a portion – but the whole planet.
Spreadsheet of money transfers to Hamas fund collector, IRFAN-Canada, and to two other Islamist entities by organizations endorsed by the Ottawa Police Service and the RCMP the very day Cpl. Cirillo was brutally murdered by a jihadist on Parliament Hill.
This spreadsheet is based on data provided by Point de Bascule. It was presented by Sun TV at the end of October.
PART 3 – The National Council of Canadian Muslims (formerly CAIR-CAN) involved in the “training” of Ottawa Police officers in spite of the endorsement given to Hamas by some of its leaders
At Point de Bascule, when we discuss the penetration of government agencies, what we particularly have in mind are Islamists who act as trainers or advisors to police officers, ministers and others who are responsible for national security. In 2005, then Ottawa Police Chief Vince Bevan told a Canadian Senate Committee that his officers had been receiving training from CAIR-CAN since 2002. This Islamist lobby, linked to the Muslim Brotherhood infrastructure, changed its name to the National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM) in July 2013.
In 2004, while Jamal Badawi and Wael Haddara were simultaneously on the Boards of CAIR-CAN / NCCM and of the Muslim Association of Canada (MAC), MAC issued a press release in which it openly supported Hamas. This endorsement came more than one year after the Canadian government, Liberal at the time, had added Hamas to a list of banned terrorist organizations.
The “training” given by Islamists is particularly harmful and dangerous because it misleads police officers on the nature and extent of the threat that they are facing by promoting, among other things, the idea that the use of force and the quest for supremacy are foreign to the Islamic doctrine. If police officers do not have a basic understanding of the doctrine motivating the Islamist enemy, how will they be able to prevent its next move, disrupt its plan, and thwart its advance?
In order to understand what the NCCM is up to, one need only consult its recently launched so-called “anti-terrorist” handbook. This manual presents jihad as “noble” (pp. 17 and 34) and promotes radical Muslim scholars, such as Siraj Wahhaj and Jamal Badawi.
In 1992, shortly after the Rodney King riots in Los Angeles, Siraj Wahhaj delivered a sermon in which he advocated harnessing street violence in the United States for the benefit of Islam. He invited his supporters to convert youth who feel excluded, and eventually arm them with Uzi submachine guns so that they can wage jihad in U.S. streets. Audio excerpts of his sermon are available on Point de Bascule. A partial transcript of his speech is available in the book Muslim Mafia (pp. 136-7) and on Point de Bascule.
In an interview published in the early 2000s, Jamal Badawi, another scholar recommended by the Ottawa Police’s Islamist trainers, incited North America-based Muslim judges and civil servants to take advantage of their positions by not applying legal provisions that are incompatible with sharia.
In a testimony given to a Senate committee in the past, NCCM / CAIR-CAN Executive Director stated that Badawi “is generally understood to be perhaps one of the best North American Islamic scholars, if not the premier.” From 2001 to 2013, Jamal Badawi was on NCCM / CAIR-CAN Board of directors. He is also an associate of the Muslim Brotherhood’s spiritual guide Youssef Qaradawi at the head of the International Union of Muslim Scholars (also WebArchive – Archive.Today).
On August 26, 2010, the Islamist training received by the Ottawa Police Service and the RCMP and other outreach activities with Islamists led them to apologize after arresting two Muslims suspected of terrorism during Ramadan. At the time, Prime Minister Harper strongly condemned the move and stressed that “There is one law for all Canadians, and no religious group should expect special treatment when it comes to enforcement of the law.”
In July 2014, Hiva Mohammad Alizadeh and Misbahuddin Ahmed, who had been arrested during the 2010 Ramadan, were found guilty on various terror-related charges.
PART 4 – The Ottawa Police Service defended Islamist Tariq Ramadan in the UK after establishing a relationship with his organization Muslim Presence in 2001
After the terrorist attacks perpetrated by Islamists on London public transit on July 7, 2005, the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) and the London Metropolitan Police sponsored a conference entitled The Middle Path (also WebArchive – Archive.Today) in order to best identify the problem of radicalization among young Muslims. It took place on July 24, 2005.
Police chiefs invited Tariq Ramadan to address the participants. During the few days between the announcement of Ramadan’s presence and the conference itself, many commentators criticized the fact that this supporter of sharia could be considered a part of the solution to the radicalization of Muslims.
Norman Brennan was one of the most committed opponents to the presence of Ramadan at the conference. At the time, he was a police officer in London and the director of an association helping victims of crime.
Norman Brennan: To allow him [Tariq Ramadan] in the UK to pontificate with his poison is bad enough, but to also sponsor him is just ridiculous. Sometimes ACPO and police organisations try to be so PC [politically correct] that they cross the line and in my view they have crossed the line. They should withdraw their support.
This is the context in which David Pepper, on behalf of the Ottawa Police Service, and Shelina Merani, from Muslim Presence, an organization founded by Tariq Ramadan, signed a letter together and sent it to The Guardian newspaper in the UK in order to influence the course of events and insure that police chiefs would not change their minds and cancel their invitation to Ramadan.
The letter to The Guardian is archived on Tariq Ramadan’s website (also WebArchive – Archive.Today). In their letter, Pepper and Merani pointed out that the Ottawa Police Service had been collaborating with Tariq Ramadan since July 2001. Then, they proceeded to praise the Islamist leader:
David Pepper and Shelina Merani: [W]e fully support Dr. Ramadan’s participation in events such as the [London] Middle Path Conference and believe that Dr. Ramadan will play an important role.
In this letter, Shelina Merani did not mention that her organization Muslim Presence had been founded by Tariq Ramadan and that he was frequently the star of the organization’s activities at that time.
Enough information was known about Tariq Ramadan in 2005 to condemn the Ottawa Police Service for associating with him and defending him. The best compendium of information concerning Tariq Ramadan remains Brother Tariq: The Doublespeak of Tariq Ramadan, a book authored by Caroline Fourest that was first published in French in 2004.
Also in 2004, in an interview to Egypt Today, Ramadan incited Islamists operating in Canada to use the Canadian legal framework, which he referred to as “one of the most open in the world,” to subtly and gradually introduce rules of sharia in Canada. At the time, Tariq Ramadan strongly urged his supporters in Canada not to openly mention their commitment to sharia: “The term shariah in itself is laden with negative connotations in the Western mind,” Ramadan said. “There is no need to stress that. […] For the time being this is not how we want to be perceived,” he added.
More recently, in 2013, in Detroit, Tariq Ramadan defined jihad as “the way we implement sharia.” Ramadan’s formulation has the advantage of including violent and non-violent methods used by Islamists to reach their goal.
In a book published in 2002, Tariq Ramadan had given unconditional support to the ideas of his grandfather Hassan Al-Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood.
In the Egypt of the 1940s, Hassan Al-Banna encouraged suicide attacks and other terrorist activities. He dedicated a whole book to explain the theological justifications of offensive jihad. In that book, Al-Banna upholds the principle that “It’s an obligation for us [Muslims] to fight against them [the non-Muslims] after inviting them [to join Islam], even if they do not fight against us.”
In his 50-point manifesto, Hassan Al-Banna promotes the abolition of political parties and the establishment of a one-party State, the reform of the law, so that it will conform to sharia, an increase in the number of youth groups promoting jihad, the prohibition of dancing, the censorship of movies and plays and a dress code for all citizens enforced by a sharia police.
In another text (To what Do We Invite Humanity?), Hassan Al-Banna refers to Adolf Hitler as a role model for Muslims looking for “success and fortune.”
In 2005, Tariq Ramadan expressed all the respect he has for Muslim Brotherhood spiritual guide Youssef Qaradawi. In 2002, Qaradawi had publicly endorsed Tariq Ramadan’s understanding of Islam by asking him to preface a compendium of fatwas that he published in French.
Over the years, Youssef Qaradawi justified the assassination of those who leave Islam (apostates) and homosexuals, he endorsed female genital mutilations, he described Hitler as “Allah’s envoy who came to punish the Jews for their corruption,” before adding that “Allah willing,” the next time it will be the believers [the Muslims] who will massacre the Jews, etc.
The outreach initiatives taken by Muslim Presence and other Islamist activists have contributed to desensitize the Ottawa Police Service’s top officers to the Islamist threat.
Islamists, like Tariq Ramadan, who promote sharia by non-violent means do not constitute an alternative to those who openly advocate violence, but represent simply the other face of the same threat. Important articles, such as one written by Islamist Muhammad Fadel explain that the “jihad of the sword” and the “jihad of the tongue” (Tariq Ramadan’s activity) do not oppose each other, but rather complement one another.
Hamas’ charter that we usually associate with armed jihad, or the “jihad of the sword” concurs:
Hamas’ charter / Article 30 Jihad is not limited to wielding arms and fighting the enemies face to face, for eloquent speech, persuasive writing, effective books, support and help – when [they are] performed with the sincere intention that Allah’s banner will reign supreme – all constitute jihad for the sake of Allah.
Point de Bascule (November 17, 2014): Canada’s Department of Foreign Affairs promotes Islamist Tariq Ramadan as “a man with a vision”
Violaine Ballivy et al. (La Presse – May 18, 2008): Salah Basalamah consulted as an expert by the Bouchard-Taylor Commission (Basalamah was described by the former Dean of McGill Faculty of Law, Peter Leuprecht, as “Tariq Ramadan’s representative in Canada.”) [Article in French]
Muslim Presence’s bases of operations throughout the world, as they were presented on the organization’s website in 2011. Right, a picture of Tariq Ramadan taken during an activity in the Ivory Coast in 2010.
PART 5 – Other cases of inappropriate collaboration between Canadian police services and Islamists were documented by Point de Bascule before the November 27 Enquête TV report
Many other cases of inappropriate collaboration between police services, security-oriented government agencies and Islamists had been reported by Point de Bascule before the November 27 Enquête TV report. Here is a sample:
APRIL 19, 2013 – The Point de Bascule article published that day was dedicated to Munir El-Kassem, the Muslim Chaplain of the London Police in Ontario. He was appointed to this sensitive position in spite of his leadership role within the World Islamic Call Society (WICS), a Libyan organization whose terror funding activities were documented in a U.S. trial, and later by the Canada Revenue Agency.
Munir El-Kassem was the main speaker at the first fundraising event held by the Canadian Institute of Islamic Civilization (CIIC) at the Brossard mosque in October 2012. The CIIC is a substructure of the Muslim Association of Canada (MAC), the main Muslim Brotherhood front in the country.
At the time, Chiheb Battikh was one of CIIC’s main leaders. Two months after this fundraising event in Brossard, Chiheb Battikh tried to kidnap for ransom the grandson of a rich businessman in a Montreal park. On March 21, 2014, Battikh pleaded guilty and was convicted to six years in jail for his crime (also WebArchive – Archive.Today).
DECEMBER 12, 2013 – In an article dedicated to the origin of the Islamist RIS conventions organized on a yearly basis in Toronto since 2003, Point de Bascule pointed out that the first convention was organized by Hussein Hamdani and sponsored by the World Assembly of Muslim Youth (WAMY), a Saudi organization whose terrorism financing activities were documented by the Canada Revenue Agency and other organizations.
In spite of his collaboration with this funder of terrorism in 2003, Hussein Hamdani was appointed by the federal government in 2005 at the Cross-Cultural Roundtable that advises Public Safety Canada and the Department of Justice on national security issues. Despite a succession of ministers at the head of Public Safety Canada, Hamdani has kept his advisor position in Canada’s security infrastructure.
AUGUST 21, 2014 – The article published that day is a retrospective of three cases of Islamists linked to the RCMP and the London Police Service in Ontario. It looks back at Munir El-Kassem and Hussein Hamdani’s cases and identifies the role played by National Council of Canadian Muslims’ Shahina Siddiqui with the RCMP in Manitoba.
In spite of the fact that she collaborated with Siraj Wahhaj, an Imam who advocates armed jihad in U.S. streets (Point de Bascule – Muslim Mafia pp. 136-7), and other radicals to organize a 1-month long training retreat for Muslim student leaders at the University of Manitoba in the past, Shahina Siddiqui is still a member of the RCMP Commissioner’s National Advisory Committee on Diversity as well as the RCMP Commanding Officers’ Diversity Committee, D-Division in Manitoba, according to her profile on the NCCM’s website (also Archive.Today). As such, she is consulted by the RCMP on national security issues.
SEPTEMBER 5, 2014 – The report published by Point de Bascule that day is dedicated to the June 8, 2012 meeting between an Islamist delegation linked to the Muslim Brotherhood infrastructure in Canada and the Minister of Public Safety, Vic Toews. As unbelievable as it may sound, it was Naseer Syed, the then lawyer of Hamas fund collector, IRFAN-Canada, who made public the report of the meeting between Islamists and Minister Toews on his website MuslimLegal.ca. By Naseer Syed’s own account, it was Hussein Hamdani, the leader of the Islamist delegation and a security advisor to the Canadian government, who gave him the report of the meeting.
According to the PowerPoint presentation made by Hussein Hamdani to Minister Vic Toews, the primary objective of the Islamist delegation was to pressure the minister to prohibit the employees of his department from referring to Islam and its principles when describing the threat being faced in Canada and other Western democracies.
This policy was adopted by CSIS after Michel Coulombe became its Director in October 2013.
In any war, in order to defeat the enemy, a key rule to follow is to be well aware of its objectives and motivations. Forbidding all allusions to Islam and its principles leads to prohibiting the required study and analysis of texts and speeches made by those who threaten us. This in turn, prevents the understanding of their objectives and how they intend to achieve them.
As Stephen Coughlin, a former Pentagon advisor now with the Washington-based Center for Security Policy explained (VIDEO 2:34), even if the enemy has a wrong understanding of Islam, it is still using it to threaten us. In these circumstances, for our own protection, it is crucial to master its doctrine, its understanding of Islam.
In a second phase, it is important to evaluate how widespread is this interpretation of Islam in order to determine the magnitude of the threat.
OCTOBER 3 AND 15, 2014 – After a Maryland-based organization announced that the Islamist security advisor to the Canadian government, Hussein Hamdani, was scheduled to meet a Maryland police chief and a local Islamist, Point de Bascule published two articles highlighting Hamdani’s links with four organizations directly involved in the funding of terrorist entities or having endorsed such entities.
Here are the links for these two articles:
Point de Bascule (October 3, 2014): Maryland Police chief scheduled to meet with CAIR apologist Rabia Chaudry and controversial Canadian security advisor Hussein Hamdani
Point de Bascule (October 15, 2014): A 4-person delegation from Public Safety Canada, including Islamist Hussein Hamdani, went to Maryland to talk about the terrorist threat
Aside from underlining Hussein Hamdani’s collaboration with the Saudi WAMY, a financer of terrorism, in order to launch the RIS conventions in Toronto in 2003, these two Point de Bascule articles describe Hamdani’s links with three other organizations having endorsed terrorist entities in the past:
IRFAN-Canada – Notwithstading being an advisor to Public Safety Canada, Hussein Hamdani kept on playing a leadership role with two organizations having contributed to IRFAN-Canada, Hamas main fund collector in the country. Many warned the public in the past of the fact that IRFAN is part of Hamas’ funding infrastructure in Canada, including Stockwell Day in 2004 while he was an Opposition MP in Ottawa. Another warning came from the United States. In 2007, IRFAN was identified as a part of the “Global Hamas financing mechanism” (subsection VIII) in the Holy Land Foundation trial in the U.S.
In April 2011, the Canada Revenue Agency revoked IRFAN’s charitable status after having concluded that, for the 2005-2009 period alone, it transferred $14.6 million to the terrorist organization Hamas. In April 2014, IRFAN was added to Canada’s list of banned terrorist groups.
Stockwell Day’s public warning about IRFAN should have been enough to convince Hamdani to keep his distance from entities funding IRFAN. Rather than doing so, Hussein Hamdani maintained his leadership positions in at least two organizations that transferred money to Hamas’s fund collector in Canada. On his official profile published when he joined the Cross-Cultural Roundtable on Security in 2005 and on his current January 2015 profile posted on the Public Safety Canada’s website, Hussein Hamdani is presented as the Halton Islamic Association’s Public Relations Officer in Ontario and as a Director on the Board of the Hamdani Foundation in St. Catharines (Ontario).
Both organizations have contributed to Hamas’s fund collector, IRFAN, while Hamdani was associated with them.
Links toward the Canada Revenue Agency’s reports documenting these money transfers are available in one of the articles mentioned above.
Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) – On October 6, 2013, Siraj Wahhaj was invited to speak at the ISNA mosque in Mississauga (Ontario) by the North American Spiritual Revival organization in spite of the Imam’s endorsement of armed jihad in U.S streets, his defense of a cop-killer, and many other radical positions. This entity is also run by Hussein Hamdani. Two weeks before the meeting, a substructure of the organization hosting the event (ISNA) had its charitable status revoked after the Canada Revenue Agency determined that the ISNA Development Foundation was providing tax receipts to a non-charitable entity collecting money for an organization waging armed jihad in India.
Muslim Association of Canada (MAC) – Hussein Hamdani also collaborates with the MAC (2005 – 2009 – 2010 – 2011) in spite of its open support for Hamas in 2004, more than one year after it was added to a list of outlawed terrorist organizations by Public Safety Canada, the very department advised by Hamdani on security matters. From 2001 to 2010, the MAC transferred $296,514 to Hamas’s fund collector, IRFAN-Canada. A recent report by Montreal’s La Presse, based on documents obtained from the RCMP, evoked the hypothesis that the MAC could have violated the law regulating charities by transferring money to IRFAN after its charitable status was revoked by the Canada Revenue Agency.
NOVEMBER 10, 2014 – After the RCMP withdrew its support for a so-called “anti-terrorist” handbook initiative carried out with the National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM – formerly CAIR-CAN), Point de Bascule published an article to describe the radicalism of Muslim scholars endorsed by the manual.
Our article also stressed that the RCMP collaborated for fourteen months with the NCCM in spite of the fact that some of its leaders and mentors have openly endorsed the terrorist organization Hamas in the past and promoted seditious behaviors by Muslim judges and civil servants in Canada.
From its incorporation in 2000 until its name change in July 2013, the NCCM was known as the Council on American Islamic Relations (Canada) / CAIR-CAN. This Canadian entity was established as a branch of the Washington-based Council on American Islamic Relations. Many documents issued by the parent organization and the Canadian branch prove it.
In 2009, in the case United States of America v. Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (Section IV), Judge Jorge Solis stated that: “The government has produced ample evidence to establish the associations of CAIR, ISNA […] with Hamas.”
This demonstration led the FBI to cut all ties with CAIR in 2009. In Canada, the RCMP, other police services and even Minister Toews responsible for Public Safety Canada continued collaborating with CAIR’s Canadian associate with a business-as-usual approach.
In January 2014, however, Prime Minister Harper’s spokesperson condemned the NCCM for its “documented ties to a terrorist organization such as Hamas.” The NCCM replied by initiating legal proceedings leading to a defamation suit against the Prime Minister’s Office. In a comment about an article published by a Saudi newspaper on the issue, Point de Bascule listed many links between the NCCM / CAIR-CAN and Hamas.
NOVEMBER 24, 2014 – Three days before the broadcast of Enquête’s episode about the non-existent Islamist threat in Quebec, Point de Bascule published an article denouncing the participation of a high-ranking RCMP officer to a conference on “de-radicalization” in Windsor (Ontario) with Faisal Kutty, a spokesman for two Al Qaeda-linked organizations in the past.
The above documented cases are a lot more than “the hint of a shred of evidence” of an Islamist penetration of police services being asked for by Radio-Canada’s Jean Pelletier. These examples are the symptoms of a serious and deeply troubling problem of Islamist penetration at the highest levels of Canada’s security infrastructure. Rather than attempting to mock those who alert the public to the danger, Jean Pelletier and Radio-Canada should dedicate a portion of the considerable resources allocated to them by Canadian taxpayers to objectively investigate the matter.
PART 6 – Experts are divided on the existence and the nature of the Islamist threat
In his defense of the November 27 episode of Enquête, Radio-Canada’s Senior Director of information, Jean Pelletier, wrote in his letter to Lise Ravary (PDF – HTML) that Radio-Canada’s TV report “does not refrain from exploring any avenues and invited high-ranking officers from government security agencies, and serious university professors recognized by their peers.”
The fact that the experts chosen by Radio-Canada’s Enquête to challenge what was presented by Marc Lebuis and Point de Bascule are qualified does not mean that there is a consensus among experts with comparable qualifications on the absence of an Islamist threat in Quebec, elsewhere in Canada and in the Western world. Enquête interviewed Ray Boisvert, a former Canadian Security Intelligence Service / CSIS Assistant Director, who appears to support Enquête’s thesis that there is no Islamist threat. However, David Harris, who also worked for CSIS, as a Senior manager, describes the current situation in a different manner when he comments about national security issues in the media. Two experts with similar backgrounds whose assessments contradict each other in large part.
On September 30, 2014, the RCMP issued a press release to dissociate itself from a so-called “anti-terrorism” booklet launched by the National Council of Canadian Muslims, as mentioned above in this article. The RCMP headquarters in Ottawa invoked “the adversarial tone set by elements of the booklet” to order its Manitoba division to withdraw from the project. The RCMP Manitoba’s involvement in the project had been a mistake from the start, but a last minute withdrawal was better than an endorsement.
On October 9, 2014, while he was invited to comment on national security issues by Paul Houde on 98.5 FM (Montreal), Michel Juneau-Katsuya disagreed with the RCMP’s decision to dissociate itself from the NCCM booklet (AUDIO 9:05). Nobody will suggest that Juneau-Katsuya is not a qualified commentator: he is a former CSIS agent. In spite of his background however, he does not consider that a document endorsing a Muslim leader advocating armed jihad in U.S. streets and another one inciting Muslim judges and civil servants not to apply Canadian laws that are incompatible with sharia should be rejected.
On this issue and on others related to the Islamist threat and national security, individuals whose qualifications are not challenged by anybody have taken opposite stands.
At the highest level of CSIS, there are different opinions on the nature of the terrorist threat and how to tackle it. Current CSIS Director, Michel Coulombe, stated in front of a Canadian Senate Committee in February 2014 that his organization now refuses to use terms referring to Islam in order to describe the terrorist threat. Expressions such as “advancing jihad,” “Islamist radicalization,” and others have been purged from CSIS’ security documents since Michel Coulombe took over its leadership. The implication of this new policy is, of course, that the Islamic doctrine and its principles are not part of the problem that faces us.
Without the use of proper terminology to define the threat, intelligence services will be compromised and rendered nonoperational.
Richard Fadden, Michel Coulombe’s predecessor at the helm of CSIS from June 2009 to May 2013, looked at things from an entirely different perspective. In his June 2011 Annual report, Mr. Fadden noted that “the main threat to Canada continues to be Islamist violence.” In June 2012, Mr. Fadden told Canadian Senators that, under his leadership, CSIS was targeting those who were “advancing jihad,” and in February 2012, CSIS released a report entitled Venues of Sunni Islamist Radicalization in Canada.
Led by Michel Coulombe, CSIS no longer investigates Muslim institutions but rather limits itself to investigating individuals. Michael Peirce, CSIS Assistant Director of Intelligence, made the troubling revelation when he testified in front of a Canadian Senate Committee in October 2014:
CSIS’ Michael Peirce in front of a Canadian Senate Committee: I should be very clear about that. When we investigate, we investigate individuals and their activities. There may be individuals whose activities may be associated with a particular institution, but it’s the individuals we investigate. For instance, we don’t investigate mosques.
Contrary to what is stated by Radio-Canada’s Jean Pelletier, more than a list of diplomas and peer recognition are needed to determine the validity of an opinion.
Furthermore, when we find out that advisors to the Canadian government in security matters have invited in Canada Islamist leaders advocating armed jihad in U.S. streets and promoted and distributed sharia manuals providing theological justifications for the use of deception in order to further the implementation of sharia in Canada (section r10.3), we have reached a stage that is far beyond examining diplomas and inquiring about peer recognition to serve as the basis for determining the worthiness of opinions and the objectives being pursued.
Further reading
Sun TV / The Source (December 30, 2014): VIDEO RCMP missing radical warning signs? (Ezra Levant and analyst Jonathan Halevi discussing radical speeches being given in mosques and other venues in Canada.)
http://eedition.interlakespectator.com/doc/Interlake-Spectator/InterlakeSpectator/2010062401/2.html#2 (also on PdeB)
Shahina Siddiqui is a member of the National Council of Canadian Muslims’ Board (NCCM – formerly known as CAIR-CAN). She is also a member of the RCMP Commissioner’s National Advisory Committee on Diversity as well as the RCMP Commanding Officers’ Diversity Committee, D-Division in Manitoba, in spite of the fact that she collaborated with an Islamist leader advocating armed jihad in U.S. streets and other radicals to organize a 1-month long training retreat for Muslim student leaders at the University of Manitoba in the past.
In May 2011, the London Link announced the appointment of Munir El-Kassem, who was involved in a Libyan organization funding terrorism, as Muslim Chaplain of the London Police Service in Ontario.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=635768793199281
https://archive.today/snQeA
A high-ranking RCMP officer took part in a conference on “de-radicalization” in Windsor (Ontario) with Faisal Kutty, a spokesman for two Al Qaeda-linked organizations in the past.
