Terrorist Front Group Outraged School Cancelled Muslim Speaker after Parents Complained

It’s ironic that the Islamic terrorist front group that bullied U.S. law enforcement agencies into purging counterterrorism training materials is outraged that a public school disinvited a Muslim speaker after parents complained. The bruhaha occurred at Northeast Middle School in Bristol, Connecticut. A Muslim woman named Annam Choudhry was scheduled to speak this week in a social studies class, according to an article in the local paper. Choudhry is the founder of a group called YURSA and she was planning to “dispel misconceptions” about the Islamic faith for the seventh-grade students.

Parents received a letter earlier this month announcing that on November 22 Choudhry would discuss misconceptions about her religion and her experiences as a female Muslim. Posted on social media, the letter describes Choudhry as “a young Muslim woman who was born and raised in New York City who now resides in Connecticut.” It continues: “She started YUSRA, an organization for the empowerment of Muslim women. Their mission is to train Muslim women to inform others about the Islamic faith and to dispel misconceptions that are prevalent in today’s society. This presentation will enrich our curriculum on world history.” Parents and other residents of the suburb, which is located about 20 miles southwest of Hartford, expressed fury.

The controversy led the Bristol Board of Education to cancel Choudhry’s engagement, claiming the teacher who scheduled it received threats, though Bristol Police Chief Brian Gould said there is no “specific threat that required police investigation at this point.” Bristol Mayor Ellen Zoppo-Sassu told the local paper she supports the superintendent’s decision to cancel the presentation for the safety of students and staff. Cries of discrimination and censorship soon followed. Calling it a “disturbing example” free speech suppression, the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) claims it has documented many protests over the teaching of Islam in schools.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), which reportedly raises money for Hamas, blasted the school district for cancelling the Muslim presentation, asserting that it “emboldens individuals and organizations in Bristol who are Islamophobic” and does a disservice to Bristol students and the community as a whole. Farhan Memon, the chairman of the group’s Connecticut chapter, said it is vital that school children are exposed to Islam at a time when the civil liberties of Muslim Americans are under attack by policies like “Trump’s Muslim Bans.” Memon also said he is “concerned that Bristol Public Schools would seemingly bow to public pressure in this manner.”

Ironically, the nation’s law enforcement agencies bowed to pressure from CAIR to alter counterterrorism training materials deemed by the group to discriminate against Muslim. Under Barack Obama, CAIR wielded tremendous power and managed to coerce law enforcement agencies at the local, state and federal level to revamp counterterrorism training materials. This includes getting the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to purge anti-terrorism training curricula of material determined by CAIR to be “offensive” to Muslims. Judicial Watch uncovered that scandal and obtained the FBI records three years ago.

Based on troves of government documents, Judicial Watch subsequently published a special, in-depth report on the scandal. CAIR is not specifically named but the records show that an undisclosed group of “Subject Matter Experts” (SME) determined the federal training material was offensive to Muslims. CAIR also got police departments in Illinois to eliminate anti-terrorism training materials and instructors deemed anti-Muslim. As an example, CAIR asserted that an instructor for the Lombard, Illinois police force wrote an article years earlier that included disparaging comments about the Prophet Muhammad. The course was called “Islamic Awareness as a Counter-Terrorist Strategy” and departments in Lombard, Elmhurst and Highland Park caved into CAIR’s demands. Earlier this year CAIR ordered the Air Force to sever ties with an instructor it considers to be anti-Muslim.

Keep in mind that CAIR is a terrorist front group with extensive links to foreign and domestic Islamists. It was founded in 1994 by three Middle Eastern extremists (Omar Ahmad, Nihad Awad and Rafeeq Jaber) who ran the American propaganda wing of Hamas, known then as the Islamic Association for Palestine. In 2008 CAIR was a co-conspirator in a federal terror-finance case involving the Hamas front group Holy Land Foundation. Read more in a Judicial Watch special report that focuses on Muslim charities. Judicial Watch also tried to find out if CAIR got the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to overhaul its anti-terrorism training but the spy agency said it could “neither confirm nor deny the existence or nonexistence of records” involving meetings or communications with the Muslim rights group. The CIA asserted that the information is classified intelligence protected from disclosure. The response goes on to cite the statutes—such as the CIA Act of 1949 and National Security Act of 1947—that allow the agency to hide even the most benign information from the American public. It’s likely that the CIA met with CAIR during the Obama years—or at least had communication with the extremist group—and doesn’t want the public to know about it.