From left to right
Kate Young – Liberal MP for London West
Jamal Taleb – Imam at the Islamic Center of Southwest Ontario
Munir El-Kassem – Official at the London Muslim Mosque and a former leader of the terror-funding WICS
John Pare – London police Chief
On July 4, 2016, community leaders from six Canadian cities (Vancouver, Calgary, London, Windsor, Toronto, and Montreal) endorsed an Islamophobia charter put forward by the National Council of Canadian Muslims in six simultaneous public events.
Initially, Radio-Canada reported that the support for the NCCM initiative was an official endorsement by six Canadian cities but later changed the title of its article and published a correction to point out that it was rather an endorsement given by personalities from these six cities (initial version – corrected version).
It appears that the activity in London was the most successful of all six from the organizers’ perspective. The NCCM managed to get police Chief John Pare to show up at their event and express his support alongside Islamist Munir El-Kassem and Ingrid Mattson, the former President of the Hamas-linked Islamic Society of North America (ISNA).
Until the demise of Muammar Gaddafi, Munir El-Kassem had a leadership position within the World Islamic Call Society, a Libyan organization whose terror funding activities were documented in a U.S. trial and later by the Canada Revenue Agency. In 2011, former London police Chief Bradley Duncan appointed Munir El-Kassem as a chaplain of his police service. Click on the image to your right to view a 2013 Point de Bascule report on the involvement of the London police Chaplain El-Kassem with the terror-funding Libyan WICS and other Islamist outfits.
Before moving back to Canada to become the Chair of Islamic studies at Huron University College in London, Ingrid Mattson had been President of the US-based Islamic Society of North America. In 2009, during her term as ISNA’s President (2006-2010), Judge Solis ruled that “The [U.S.] Government has produced ample evidence to establish the association of […] ISNA […] with Hamas.” (pp.14-15 of 20)
Aside from being engaged in the destruction of Israel (article 13), Hamas’ leaders have frequently advocated an Islamic conquest of the West (2006 – 2008 – 2011 – 2012). In 2011, for example, Hamas leader Mahmoud Al-Zahhar said on TV that the Western civilization “will not be able to withstand the great and glorious Islam.” On July 16, 2013, Hamas threatened to launch terrorist attacks in countries where Israel’s embassies are located. Canada is among the potential targets, of course.
In 2000, at an ISNA conference, Ingrid Mattson was asked to suggest the best tafseer (Koranic commentary) available. According to Young Muslims Canada, she answered that “So far, probably the best work of Tafseer in English is by Maulana Abul A’la Maududi [aka Syed Maududi].”
In the portion of his tafsir dedicated to verse 4:24, Maududi condoned the rape of non-Muslim female prisoners of war by Muslims. This doctrinal justification led to the rape of the Yazidi female prisoners of war on a large scale by the Islamic State in Iraq. According to the Guardian, “When [Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi] made his speech in July [2014] at Mosul’s Great Mosque declaring the creation of an Islamic state with himself as its caliph, [he] quoted at length from the Indian/Pakistani thinker Abul A’la Maududi [aka Syed Maududi], the founder of the Jamaat-e-Islami party in 1941 and originator of the contemporary term Islamic state.”
Rukmini Callimachi (The New York Times – August 13, 2015): ISIS Enshrines a Theology of Rape / Archive.Today
The relevant portion of Maududi’s tafsir can be accessed on the website English tafsir or by clicking on the excerpt to your right.
In his book Jihad in Islam, Ingrid Mattson’s mentor also described the mission of Islam as being the “destr[uction of] all States and Governments anywhere on the face of the earth which are opposed to the ideology and programme of Islam.”
On July 7, 2016, the very day Point de Bascule published this article, The Lawfare Project released a communiqué indicating that Ingrid Mattson recently agreed to have the Superior Court of Ontario dismiss her own defamation suit against David Harris, an Ottawa-based terrorism expert, who had called her a “radical’ in the past and exposed some of her links with Islamist organizations, such as ISNA (already mentioned) and the International Institute of Islamic Thought.
On July 4, no NCCM Islamophobia charter-related activities were scheduled in Ottawa. The next day, however, the NCCM tweeted its thanks to the Ottawa Police Service and Chief Bordeleau for supporting its Islamophobia charter initiative. The newspapers and websites (listed below) that covered the NCCM July 4 Islamophobia charter initiative do not identify police services other than London and Ottawa that supported the initiative.
The reluctance of Canadian police services to endorse the NCCM may have something to do, in part, with the fact that, in September 2014, the RCMP had to distance itself from the NCCM after it realized that a so-called ‘anti-terrorism’ booklet it had been working on with the NCCM was very problematic.
Among the North American Muslim scholars promoted in that booklet to counter the violent narrative, the NCCM suggested many scholars with a radical past. Among them, Imam Siraj Wahhaj who advocated converting to Islam youth who felt excluded, and eventually arming them with Uzi submachine guns so that they can wage jihad in U.S. streets (Point de Bascule – Muslim Mafia / pp. 136-137). In the same booklet, the NCCM also endorsed Jamal Badawi who declared in an interview that Muslims should become judges and civil servants in North America and take advantage of their influential positions in order to stop applying current legal provisions that are incompatible with sharia.
Point de Bascule (November 10, 2014): An Imam promoting armed jihad in U.S. streets and other radical scholars consulted by the NCCM “to gain an accurate understanding” of Islam
Silencing the critics of the Islamist threat
As noted in a report broadcast by the Belgian public TV network RTBF shortly after the terrorist attacks in Brussels, the concept of ‘Islamophobia’ is being used by the Muslim Brotherhood and organizations close to it to prevent any criticism of Islam. In this Belgian TV report, sociologist Gilles Kepel highlighted that “Islamophobia is a weapon being used against non-Muslims who criticize Islam. It is also being used against those Muslims who have a wrong interpretation of Islam, in other words an interpretation that they disagree with.”
In 2010, Abdur-Rahman Muhammad recalled that, as a Muslim Brotherhood activist, he had attended a meeting organized in the offices of the International Institute of Islamic Thought in Northern Virginia, a Brotherhood affiliate, when the term ‘Islamophobia’ was coined. In a piece written for the New York Daily News, Muhammad stated that the term ‘Islamophobia’ “is nothing more than a thought-terminating cliche conceived in the bowels of Muslim think tanks for the purpose of beating down critics.”
In December 2012, then Liberal leadership candidate Justin Trudeau announced his intention to speak at the RIS convention in Toronto later that month. On December 12, 2012, Point de Bascule published an article condemning Mr. Trudeau’s decision because the event was being sponsored by IRFAN-Canada whose charitable status had been revoked by the Canada Revenue Agency the year before because it transferred funds to the terrorist organization Hamas. The same day, the NCCM (then called CAIR-Canada) went on the offensive and retorted that Point de Bascule was being “Islamophobic.” If the denunciation of an outfit whose charitable status has been revoked for funding terrorism is not acceptable to the NCCM, nothing short of a complete servility toward the Islamists will pass the NCCM test and not be labeled “hateful” or “Islamophobic.”
On December 15, 2012, three days after the initial Point de Bascule article about IRFAN and Justin Trudeau was published and the news picked up by mainstream media, IRFAN withdrew its sponsorship of the event. What the NCCM presented as an irrational fear, a phobia, an Islamophobia proved to be a very legitimate concern. In 2014, IRFAN-Canada itself was added to Canada’s list of outlawed terrorist groups.
Coverage of the NCCM Islamophobia charter launch
GENERAL
NCCM (July 4, 2016): Press release announcing events being organized in six Canadian cities in support of the NCCM Islamophobia charter / WebArchive – Archive.Today (Vancouver, Calgary, London, Windsor, Toronto, and Montreal)
Jodi Hughes (Global News – July 4, 2016): Canada-wide initiative launched to combat Islamophobia / WebArchive – Archive.Today
Ilana Shneider (CIJ News – July 3, 2016): Six Canadian cities to sign a charter condemning anti-Muslim hate crimes / Archive.Today
Radio-Canada (July 4, 2016): A charter condemning Islamophobia was signed in six Canadian cities / WebArchive – Archive.Today [Article in French]
Mathieu Bock-Côté (Journal de Montréal – July 7, 2016): The Islamophobia blackmail / Archive.Today [Article in French]
VANCOUVER
BC Civil Liberties (Twitter – July 4, 2016): PHOTO Congratulations to the NCCM for the launch of its Islamophobia charter in Vancouver / WebArchive – Archive.Today
CALGARY
Ayesha Clough (CBC News – July 4, 2016): Calgary among 6 Canadian cities to sign charter against Islamophobia / WebArchive – Archive.Today
Deepak Obhrai (Twitter – July 4, 2016): PHOTO Conservative MP for Calgary Forest Lawn, Deepak Obhrai, gives his support to the NCCM Islamophobia charter / WebArchive – Archive.Today (NCCM activist Hida Fadol is on the picture.)
LONDON
Talk Radio AM640 (July 4, 2016): NCCM Urges Londoners to Endorse Charter for Inclusive Communities / WebArchive – Archive.Today (The presence of Ingrid Mattson is highlighted.)
Hala Ghonaim (The London Free Press – July 4, 2016): PHOTO Charter condemning all forms of Islamophobia launched in London, Canada / Archive.Today (A photo shows that Munir El-Kassem took part to the event.)
WINDSOR
Kathy Rumleski (CTV – July 3, 2016): Canadian Muslim council to address Islamophobia at Windsor media conference / WebArchive – Archive.Today (Saleha Khan is presented as an NCCM London chapter spokesperson by CTV Windsor.)
Dave Battagello (Windsor Star – July 4, 2016): Islamophobia and racial attacks on Muslims need to stop, leaders say / WebArchive – Archive.Today (The presence of Ihsaan Gardee is highlighted.)
Mike Vlasveld (BlackburnNews.com – July 4, 2015): National Call to Stop Islamophobia / WebArchive – Archive.Today
TORONTO
Jillian D’Amours (Middle East Eye – July 4, 2016): Canadian rights groups unveil charter to combat rising Islamophobia / WebArchive – Archive.Today
Telesur (July 5, 2016): Charter against Islamophobia Unveiled in Canada by Rights Group / WebArchive – Archive.Today
Nicolas Keung (Toronto Star – July 4, 2016): New charter urges Canadians to unite against Islamophobia
OTTAWA (There were no events organized in Ottawa.)
NCCM (Twitter – July 4, 2016): The NCCM thanks the Ottawa Police Service and Chief Bordeleau for endorsing its Islamophobia charter / WebArchive – Archive.Today
MONTREAL
Frank Baylis (Twitter – July 4, 2016): PHOTO Liberal MP for Pierrefonds-Dollard, Frank Baylis, gives his support to the NCCM Islamophobia charter / WebArchive – Archive.Today (NCCM activists Amira Elghawaby and Eduardo Alves attended the event in Montreal.)
NCCM (Facebook – July 4, 2016): PHOTO The Liberal MP for Pierrefonds-Dollard, Frank Baylis, took part to the launch of the NCCM Islamophobia charter / WebArchive – Archive.Today
Haroun Bouazzi / AMAL-Québec (Facebook – July 4, 2016): Endorsement of the NCCM Islamophobia Charter / WebArchive – Archive.Today
Further reading
Point de Bascule: FILE National Council of Canadian Muslims
Point de Bascule: FILE Sharia / Self vandalism
