Keith Ellison
From WikiIslam
Democratic Congressman Keith Ellison is currently serving his second term representing the Fifth District of Minnesota, which consists of Minneapolis and surrounding suburbs. He sits on the House Financial Services and Foreign Affairs committees. As the first Muslim elected to Congress, Keith Ellison requested the 18th century copy of the Qur'an once owned by Thomas Jefferson for the unofficial part of his swearing.[1]
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[edit] Ellison's views on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq
On May 14, 2009 he voted against H.R. 2346, the Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2009, because he did not believe that it represented enough of a departure from past policies in Iraq and Afghanstan. He believes that "a continuation of the policies of military occupation in both countries undercuts our diplomatic efforts to promote peace and stability in the region." He stated that "most Afghans are eager to find domestic political solutions without an extensive military resence and prolonged occupation."[2]
[edit] Ellison's Hajj controversy
In July 2009, the Minnesota GOP asked the House ethics committee to investigate charges that Ellison failed to report the cost of a pilgrimage to Mecca taken shortly before the inauguration and paid for by the Muslim American Society of Minnesota.[3] In a letter to the House Ethics Committee, state GOP Party Chairman Tony Sutton also called on Ellison to apologize and reimburse the state for the trip's costs, which Ellison had not disclosed.[4] According to the Star Tribune, Ellison was accompanied to Mecca by the executive director of the TiZA school, Asad Zaman, who is also a political contributor of Ellison's and former president of the Muslim American Society. Tax records show the Muslim American Society of Minnesota received nearly $900,000 in taxpayer money in 2006 and 2007 from a rental arrangement for Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy (TiZA), an Inver Grove Heights charter school. The school received state funding to pay rent to the Muslim American Society Property Holding Corp., a nonprofit spinoff of the Muslim American Society that owned the building. The corporation then turned $879,000 to the Muslim society as a grant. TiZA has been sued by the American Civil Liberties Union and probed by state officials for allegedly promoting Islam, which would violate the church and state separation required of public schools -- including charter schools.[5] In October 2009, after a months-long review by the Minnesota House ethics panel, Ellison disclosed the amount of his privately-paid, two-week trip to Mecca in December 2008: $13,350.[6]
The Muslim American Society (MAS) has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood which is dedicated, in its own words, to “a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and ’sabotaging’ its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.”[7] According to an article in the Chicago Tribune:[8]
Jihad Watch quoted Joseph Abram's January 8, 2009 Fox News article titled "Group That Funded Rep. Ellison's Pilgrimage to Mecca Called a Front for Extremism":
The MAS was founded by members of the Muslim Brotherhood, an international Islamist movement created in Egypt in 1928. Radical members of the Brotherhood founded the terror group Hamas and were among the first members of Al Qaeda.
The Muslim American Society's former secretary general has acknowledged that the group was founded by the Brotherhood, and in 2004 he estimated that about half of MAS members were in the Muslim Brotherhood.
"Ikhwan [Brotherhood] members founded MAS, but MAS went way beyond that point of conception," Shaker Elsayed told the Chicago Tribune, explaining that the group had expanded to include a wider viewpoint.[9][edit] Ellison and CAIR
The Council of American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) is an unindicted co-conspirator in a federal terrorism financing trial[10] with ties to Al-Qaeda.[11]
According to the Investigative Project on Terrorism, November 23, 2009:
[edit] References
- ↑ First Muslim in U.S. Congress to use historic Koran - Reuters - The Washington Post, January 3, 2007
- ↑ Keith Explains His Vote Against the May 2009 War Supplemental
- ↑ GOP seeks ethics probe of Ellison's Mecca trip - Glenn Thrush - Politico, July 24, 2009
- ↑ State GOP wants probe into Ellison's pilgrimage to Mecca - Kevin Diaz - Star Tribune, July 22, 2009
- ↑ Islamic nonprofit paid for Rep. Ellison's pilgrimage to Mecca - Kevin Diaz - Star Tribune, July 22, 2009
- ↑ Ellison reveals cost of trip to Mecca: $13.5K - Kevin Diaz - Star Tribune, October 8, 2009
- ↑ An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Brotherhood in North America - Mohamed Akram - Investigative Project on Terrorism, May 19, 1991
- ↑ A rare look at secretive Brotherhood in America - Noreen S. Ahmed-Ullah, Sam Roe and Laurie Cohen - Chicago Tribune, September 19, 2004
- ↑ Mahdi Bray: Muslim American Society didn't pay for Ellison's hajj; Ellison's office: Yes, they did - Marisol - Jihad Watch, January 2009
- ↑ CAIR Fingered by Feds - Patrick Poole - FrontPageMagazine.com, June 8, 2007
- ↑ CAIR and Al-Qaeda Connected; Does Anyone in Old Media Care? - Tom Blumer - NewsBusters, June 24, 2007
- ↑ Rep. Keith Ellison, the Islamists' Man on Capitol Hill - IPT News, November 23, 2009
[edit] See Also
Other Muslim public figures in America:
