By
Remember Homeland Security Chief Tom Ridge’s color-coded warning system?
He should have put himself on Red–a “severe risk” of attack–for his ludicrous meeting with Arab-American supporters of terrorism–and even a terrorist.
It’s never expected for those who are supposed to protect us to break bread with those who endanger us. But on Tuesday, April 16, at Dearborn, Michigan’s “La Shish” Restaurant, Ridge and Treasury Secretary O’Neill “broke pita” with Imad Hamad, Ismael Ahmed, Ali Berry, Osama Siblani, Imam Hassan Qazwini, and several other Detroit area Muslim Arab leaders–all of whom applaud Arab terrorism.
A scarier cast of characters would be hard to find:

Imad Hamad–Hamad, traipsing around as regional director of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, is a Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) terrorist, according to the INS. The INS fought his application for citizenship for years in court. Unfortunately, a weak immigration judge bowed to political pressure, disregarded the “secret evidence” against Hamad, and allowed him to become a U.S. citizen.
PFLP is most recently responsible for assassinating the Israeli Tourism Minister, Rahavam Ze’evi, and several homicide bombings. In the 70’s, PFLP and terrorist Carlos the Jackal conducted joint terrorist operations against Americans, according to terrorism expert Yigal Carmon, and PFLP also attempted to blow up airplanes, some containing Americans.
That a so-called American-Arab “civil rights” group would employ an accused terrorist as a high-ranking official–after it fought for his citizenship–says a lot. Incredibly, Hamad had the nerve to tell Ridge and O’Neill he “wants to maintain a relationship of trust [with] the government.”
But wait, there’s more.
Ismael Ahmed–Ahmed heads the Arab Community Center for Economic and Social Services (ACCESS), the largest Arab welfare agency in North America, which funded driving lessons for men believed to be Al-Queda terrorists. Ahmed strongly opposed the Clinton Counter-terrorism Act of 1996 because it prohibited donations to terrorist groups. When federal authorities looked for Nabil Almarabh, believed to be a close associate to Osama Bin Laden, they found three men in Almarabh’s former southwest Detroit residence. The men–who still had IDs from their former jobs as Detroit Airport Sky Chef employees–possessed false IDs, and a day planner with notes and sketches regarding a U.S. military base in Turkey, a Turkish airport, the American “foreign minister” and the Amman, Jordan airport. According to the Detroit Free Press, Ahmed’s ACCESS funded commercial driving lessons and attempts for hazardous materials hauling certificates for two of the three men, Ahmed Hannan and Karim Koubriti.
Ahmed didn’t seem to care much about this, even though, ACCESS–which had $8 million in revenue in 2000—gets at least 60 percent of its funds from us taxpayers, according to Crain’s Detroit Business. “We send people to all kinds of training programs and we don’t check their political credentials.” In other words, “I don’t care if your tax money funds my agency, it’s my party, and I’ll help terrorists if I want to.”
This tax-funded organization, which sees being an Al-Quaida terrorist a mere, benign “political credential” is now being paid $1.3 million to provide “sensitivity training” on Arabs and Muslims to the Dearborn Police Department, Wayne County Sheriff’s Department, and Dearborn and Detroit Public Schools.
Ali Berry–Berry, of the Lebanese-American Heritage Club, is cousin to Nabih Berry, former chief of Lebanon’s Shiite Amal Militia, is now the Speaker of Lebanon’s Parliament. A puppet of terrorist-group Hezbollah and Syria (a Hezbollah state-sponsor), Nabih Berry was requested by Hezbollah terrorist hijackers on TWA Flight 847, in which they tortured Navy Diver Robert Stethem to death, then threw out his body. Nabih Berry’s Dearborn-based niece, Elizabeth, confirmed that Ali Berry is Nabih’s cousin.
Osama Siblani–Siblani is Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of the Arab-American News, a “newspaper” that constantly praises terrorists and homicide bombers. Siblani’s wife, M. Kay Siblani, Executive Editor of this rag, is an official of CAIR, the Council on American Islamic Relations. According to former FBI Counterterrorism chief Oliver “Buck” Revell, CAIR is a Hamas front-group which got its seed money and several employees from Islamic Association for Palestine, another Hamas front group.
The Arab-American News not only loves terrorists and extremist Nation of Islam Leader Louis Farrakhan, it runs anti-Semitic diatribes by neo-Nazis, America-hating articles, and frequent bigoted pieces against American Christian leaders. An article in the May 19-25, 2001 Arab-American News attacked Rev. Franklin Graham and Prison Ministries chief Chuck Colson as using slavery in Sudan–which Arab-American News claims doesn’t exist despite millions of living and dead examples–“to attract publicity and money. They (evangelists) can smell the money coming.”
The paper dismissed them as “business-minded self-publicists,” saying, “the religious right” is “not sincere in its efforts.” Then, it made the completely false, preposterous statement that, “[E]vangelists–who are also directors in large corporations that back the Bush administration–might be eyeing Sudan’s oilfields.” Which evangelists? Which corporations? It’s simply false.
Hassan Qazwini–Imam of the largest mosque in North America, the Islamic Center of America, Shi’ite Muslim Qazwini invited Farrakhan to speak at a 1998 mosque religious service, introducing Farrakhan as “our dear brother,” “a freedom fighter,” and “a man of courage and sacrifice.” Resembling a Hitler rally, Farrakhan ranted about “forces of evil (occupying our government). … We should perform a jihad. [They are] frightened, and we must frighten them even more.” This garnered frenzied applause and cheers from Qazwini and his congregants.
It’s bad enough that Ridge and O’Neill met with this cast of terrorist-lovers. But, they also made concessions to them, saying they’ll allow new donations to government-raided and -shuttered funders of terror, like Holy Land Foundation and Global Relief Foundation.
With friends like these, who needs enemies?