CAIR targets U.S. Air Force instructor who explains Shariah

After successfully "purging" the military and federal government of "anti-Muslim" subject-matter experts and materials under the Obama administration, the Council on American-Islamic Relations is urging the Air Force under the Trump administration to sever ties with a veteran counter-terrorism instructor it casts as "Islamophobic."

CAIR's Florida branch, in a letter to U.S. Air Force Special Operations Commander Lt. Gen. Marshall B. Webb, charges Patrick Dunleavy is associated with an "anti-Muslim propaganda mouthpiece, and has made a number of false statements betraying a personal prejudice against Islam and Muslims."

Patrick Dunleavy

Dunleavy, a former deputy inspector general for the New York State Department of Corrections, is an instructor for a course in the United States Air Force Special Operations School called "The Dynamics of International Terrorism."

The author of the book "The Fertile Soil of Jihad: Terrorism's Prison Connection," Dunleavy has testified as an expert witness before the House Committee on Homeland Security concerning the threat of Islamic radicalization in the U.S. prison system. He has served as a consultant for the FBI and the International Association of Chiefs of Police on the National Data Exchange Program. He also has been a featured speaker at the Army's Counter Terrorism Conference.

But CAIR – regarded by the FBI as a Hamas front in the U.S., by the Justice Department as an unindicted co-conspirator in a terror-funding plot and by the United Arab Emirates as a terrorist organization – is demanding that the Air Force drop Dunleavy, citing his status as a senior fellow with Steven Emerson's Investigative Project on Terrorism and statements he has made about Islam that CAIR considers false.

If you support WND’s fight to expose the Hamas front in the U.S., the Council on American-Islamic Relations, CAIR, please consider a donation to the WND Legal Defense Fund for court fights like this one – which must be one if America is to remain free – and safe.

Dunleavy told WND in an email he has never had complaints from students.

"I was somewhat perplexed by the CAIR accusation," he said. "Having taught a class on 'Prison Radicalization' in the USAF Special Operations School's Dynamics in International Terrorism for over five years to a group of students which included members of every branch of the U.S. military, FBI special agents, and other federal law enforcement agencies, there has never been any negative reviews of my class presentation, nor were any offensive statements or material found in my lesson plan after review by the USAF at Hurlburt Field.

"Unfortunately, 'labeling' is now a convenient close-minded way to besmirch someone without ever actually hearing them speak," Dunleavy said.

The U.S. Air Force Special Operations School and Air Force Central Command did not respond to WND's request for its reaction to CAIR's letter and to disclose whether it will take any action.

USAF Lt. Gen. Marshall Webb

In its March 17 letter to Lt. Gen. Webb, CAIR noted that, in 2012, then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey ordered the U.S. military to "scour its training material to ensure it doesn't contain anti-Islamic content."

"Mr. Dunleavy's public statements and professional affiliations indicate that he is part of the issue Dempsey was trying to resolve," CAIR said.

The letter, by CAIR-Florida Communications Director Wilfredo A. Ruiz, cited the following "past Islamophobic statements" made by Dunleavy:

1) "To Americans [morality] means individual liberty, equal rights for men and women, religious freedom, free speech, etc. But these are contrary to the moral code of Islam."

2) "The concept of 'friendship' … is a relationship based on at least some degree of shared moral and political ideals. By that standard no Muslim nation is a friend of the U.S."

3) "To many Muslim parents, visions of violence and death are indeed the 'better future.'"

In an article about CAIR's move to have Dunleavy sacked, the Investigative Project on Terrorism said Dunleavy's statements can be verified while CAIR's lack of credibility must be taken into account.

According to evidence entered in the terror-financing case, CAIR was founded by figures associated with Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood, the worldwide movement that has stated its intent to transform the U.S. into an Islamic state. More than a dozen CAIR leaders have been charged or convicted of terrorism-related crimes.

CAIR has sued the authors of a WND Books exposé, "Muslim Mafia: Inside the Secret Underworld That's Conspiring to Islamize America," which documented the group's radical ties. A trial in the case is expected to commence this fall.

IPT pointed out that Air Force officials "already have reviewed all of Dunleavy's USAFSOS presentations and told him that they found nothing offensive."

Regarding Dunleavy's statement about Islam's "moral code," IPT pointed to the treatment of women, gays and other minorities living in majority-Muslim nations. IPT also cited polls that show 88 percent of Egypt's Muslims believe death is the appropriate punishment for "apostasy," leaving Islam, and more than a third of young British Muslims agreed.

Regarding the "concept of friendship," IPT cites Quran 5:51, which instructs Muslims not to "take the Jews and the Christians as allies."

IPT said, finally, that Dunleavy's statement that Muslim children are being indoctrinated in the value of "martyrdom" is demonstrated in the Palestinian territories.

"CAIR has never condemned this indoctrination," IPT said, "and on a broader level, its officials refuse to condemn Hamas by name. In fact, they take great umbrage at the suggestion this is something worth doing."

CAIR, however, IPT said, "does find time to smear a veteran law enforcement official and expert on radicalization because it does not agree with his message."

"It's time for law enforcement officials, the military and the media to follow the FBI's lead and recognize CAIR for what it is and simply dismiss such baseless attacks out of hand," IPT said.

CAIR in its letter, also accused IPT's founder, Steven Emerson, of "making Islamophobic and factually inaccurate statements," most recently, it claimed, regarding "no-go zones" in Britain.

But, as WND reported in January 2015, the governments of Britain, France and other European countries have identified specific enclaves where Muslim immigrants have chosen not to assimilate and law enforcement has lost some degree of control.

'Scrubbing, sanitizing, erasing

As WND reported, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, in a Senate hearing last June, spotlighted a "purge" of government and military materials and training regarding Islam and terrorism that took place under Obama.

The hearing was titled "Willful Blindness: Consequences of Agency Efforts to De-emphasize Radical Islam in Combating Terrorism."

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, chairs Senate hearing on "Willful Blindness" June 28, 2016 (Screenshot Senate Judiciary Committee video).

Cruz cited the testimony of a former DHS Islam subject-matter expert, Philip Haney, who "described a systematic policy, indeed of scrubbing, sanitizing, erasing references to radical Islam" during his more than a decade of service with the department.

Cruz displayed a chart showing the scrubbing of Islamic words from the government's lexicon that were deemed "offensive" or "bigoted," noting there were 126 references to "jihad" in the 9/11 commission report but none to that word in four related documents issued under Obama.

Haney testified that the administration eliminated more than 800 of his records related to the Muslim Brotherhood network in the U.S. because they somehow were an offense to Muslims.

DHS agent Philip Haney's blockbuster revelations of the federal government's appeasement of supremacist Islam are told in his book, "See Something Say Nothing."

Another witness at the hearing, invited by Democrats, was Ferhana Khera of the activist group Muslim Advocates, who was the author of a 2011 letter demanding a purge of training materials.

She called on the Justice Department to open an "immediate investigation" into the FBI's "use of grossly inaccurate, inflammatory, and highly offensive counterterrorism training materials about Muslims and Islam used to train its agents and other law enforcement."

Farhana Khera testifies at Senate hearing June 28, 2016 (Screenshot Senate Judiciary Committee video).

Among the "woefully misinformed statements about Islam and bigoted stereotypes about Muslims" in FBI training was the assertion that there "may not be a 'radical' threat as much as it is simply a normal assertion of the orthodox theology … [t]he strategic themes animating these Islamic values are not fringe; they are main stream.”

The Washington, D.C., watchdog Judicial Watch, which obtained documentation of the "purge," said it also tried to find out if CAIR got the CIA to overhaul its anti-terrorism training. The spy agency replied that it could “neither confirm nor deny the existence or nonexistence of records” involving meetings or communications with CAIR.

In her prepared testimony at the Senate hearing, Khera said the "use of bigoted trainers and materials in the recent past is not only highly offensive, disparaging the faith of millions of Americans, but leads to biased policing that targets individuals and communities based on religion, rather than based upon evidence of wrongdoing."

Cruz, referring to his chart showing the scrubbing of Islamic words from the government's lexicon, asked Khera if it was her organization's position that the 126 references to "jihad" in the 9/11 commission report were "offensive" or "bigoted."

After not receiving an answer the first time, he posed the question again.

Khera stuttered before collecting her thoughts, saying "our concern is not just terminology, but it's about what these materials are communicating."

Cruz tried again: "So my understanding is you don’t think it's bigoted to use jihad? I just want to understand your organization's position, whether or not it is bigoted to use the word jihad.

"So, this is when I think it's problematic," Khera said, "I think it's problematic when we have public officials – whether it's members of Congress, members of the administration, who are going out and describing the problem as a problem of jihad or a problem of radical Islamic terrorism.

"That's a problem, because it's actually playing in to the propaganda aim of ISIS," she said. "And it makes us less safe, because ISIS wants this to be a war against Islam, and by using religiously loaded terminology like jihad, we're playing into their mindset."

She said further that "it's not only that, it's just grossly inaccurate."

"I think we need to call the threat what it is. It's ISIS, it's al-Qaida," she said. "And it's no different than the KKK or those who attack abortion clinics.

"We wouldn’t go and say, 'There's a problem with radical Christianity or radical Christian terrorism. We call the threat what it is. It's the KKK. It's those who are attacking women's health clinics."

Cruz noted that he had asked Khera twice whether or not her organization thought the 9/11 report was bigoted and said he would try to ask the question a different way.

Khera interrupted, saying she must have misunderstood the question. She said her problem is not necessarily with the use of the term jihad but with the way in which officials in general were talking about the threat.

"Well, if it wasn't a concern, then why would it be purged from 126 down to zero, zero, zero, zero?" Cruz asked, referring to four documents issued under Obama.

"I cannot explain," she said. "I cannot speak for the administration, these government agencies that did that, and what their thinking was in the development of those documents."

Cruz interjected, pointing out the purging of the language was done "in response to a request from your organization in writing, calling for a 'purge.'"

Khera said that what she and her organization asked for was a purging of "bigoted training materials."