Congress Passes “The Global Anti-Islam Review Act”

ESAM AL-AMIN prescribes in  "CounterPunch", the following remedy that will aid in healing old wounds and bridging the divide that exists between the West and the Global Muslim Community:

Even though peaceful demonstrations represent a civilized way to express strongly-held beliefs, and expressions of anger and protestations, the gulf between Muslim and Western societies is still very wide. While calls for international laws against libel, slander, or incitement that lead to the imminent breach of peace are legitimate, even laudable, unsubstantiated accusations are not. Muslim scholars, leaders, institutions, and governments must understand the cultural, legal, and political limits placed on secular democratic governments. While criticizing the U.S. or French governments of double standards when it comes to free speech against Muslim sensibilities is legitimate, accusing them of producing or promoting the vile movie or the offensive political cartoons is not only wrong, but also counterproductive.

There are two competing interests that prudent legal minds must reconcile in the interest of preserving global peace and harmony, namely free speech and expression that allow legitimate criticism, or unlimited harsh, even hostile, analysis, on the one hand, and the ban of libel, slander, and violent incitement on the other. Indeed all civilized societies have laws that criminalize or impose hefty fines on such transgressions.

Libel and slander are forms of defamation.  Defamation is a common law tort in which an individual makes a publication or representation of a defamatory statement concerning an individual or entity that damages his or its reputation or standing. The elements of such transgressions include: the defamatory statement; the publication of the statement which the instigator knew or should have known was false; and finally that such statement or depiction caused injury to the subject of thecommunication. One could easily argue that all these elements were covered in the current cases. The challenge is how to widen Western slander and libel laws to also protect the reputation and legacy of historical venerated figures and symbols from outrageous insults and despicable fabrications of their lives.

Western governments and societies certainly do not have to associate themselves with people who carry a political or cultural agenda. They certainly have a choice to make and thus bear the consequences of their choices. They can continue to sanction and promote such vile and slanderous speech by considering it a part of their tradition of free speech and expression despite its devastating implications on Muslims worldwide including their own Muslim citizens, in which case a world of constant tension and mistrust would continue. 

Or they can extend their libel and slander laws to cover these types of hate speech that result in injurious consequences in the same fashion any ordinary citizen or entity could charge or sue another person for the attempt to falsify his history or to slander and destroy his reputation.

Washington D.C. and on the campaign trail in Florida – October 16, 2012

In an historic election year to elect (or re-elect) a president, and with a continuous rise of anti-Islamic incidents around the world, the United States Congress rushed back to Capitol Hill from its October recess in order to pass “the Global Anti-Islam Review Act.”

The legislation to monitor and stop anti-Muslim acts or hate speech was passed unanimously in the House and Senate without a single dissenting vote. President Barack Obama immediately signed it in the White House with over 100 American Muslim leaders smiling behind him.

According to the Associated Press, President Obama said he signed into law a bill requiring the State Department to monitor global anti-Islamic conduct or speech and annually rate countries accordingly. “This nation will keep watch; we will make sure that the impulse of Islamophobia never finds a home in the modern world,” Obama said as he campaigned in the key battleground state of Florida.

“Extending freedom also means disrupting the evil of anti-Muslim haters,” Obama told thousands of cheering supporters packed in a sports arena usually used by the Florida Panthers professional ice hockey team. “Today, I signed the Global Anti-Islam Review Act of 2012. This law commits the government to keep a record of anti-Muslim acts throughout the world, and also a record of responses to those acts,” he said. American Muslim groups have hailed the bill’s passage, saying it provided a new avenue to fight Islamophobia.

Under the legislation, the State Department will have to produce an annual report on Islamophobia around the world and form a specific office headed by a special envoy to document such abuses and design strategies to combat them.

In the preamble to the bill Congress made the following findings:

(1) Acts of anti-Muslim hatred in countries throughout the world, including some of the world’s strongest democracies, have increased significantly in frequency and scope over the last several years.

(2) Islamophobia in old and new forms is also increasingly emanating in Western societies in a sustained  basis, including through books and movies.

(3) In 2012, anti-Islamic film was produced in the U.S. called “Innocence of Muslim,” which is based upon a fabricated history of the life of the prophet Muhammad to justify violence against Muslims.

(4) The sharp rise in anti-Muslim violence has caused international organizations such as the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to elevate, and bring          renewed focus to, the issue, including the convening by the OSCE of a conference in Vienna dedicated solely to the issue of Islamophobia.

(5) Anti-Muslim hate has at times taken the form of  vilification of Islam, the religion of over 1.5 Billion people, and incitement against Muslims.

In the sense of Congress section, the bill stated: It is the sense of Congress that:

(1) the United States Government should continue to strongly support efforts to combat anti-Muslim hatred worldwide through bilateral relationships and interaction with international organizations such as the OSCE, the European Union, and the United Nations; and 

(2) the Department of State should thoroughly document acts of Islamophobia that occur around the world.

In case you wondered if this was a daydream or fantasy, the answer is that every quote above from either the president or the bill did actually take place. The U.S. Congress indeed passed such a law with its related findings as outlined above

Just replace “2012” with “2004”, President Barack Obama with President George W. Bush, “Innocence of Muslims” film with “Horseman without a Horse,” an Arab TV Series, American Muslim leaders with American Jewish leaders, Muslims with Jews, vilification of “Islam” with vilification of “Zionism and Israel”, and every “anti-Islam”, “Islamophobia”, or “anti-Muslim hatred” word above with “Anti-Semitism” and you would get Public Law 108-332, The Global Anti-Semitism Review Act.

Tea Party Ties With Hate Groups

By William Fisher
Courtesy Of "IPS News"



NEW YORK, Oct 21, 2010 (IPS) - Asserting that "the majority of Tea Party supporters are sincere, principled people of good will", the head of the National Association of Colored People (NAACP) and other U.S. civil rights leaders are calling on the populist political grouping to purge itself of known racists lest they influence the direction of the movement.

The Tea Party is a loose association of independent groups or chapters that emerged in 2009. It lacks a single leader or spokesperson, and in general, focuses on lower taxes, illegal immigration, and less government involvement in the lives of ordinary citizens.

The groups that comprise the Tea Party have not put forward any policy proposals for achieving these goals. Its supporters are overwhelmingly white. In the upcoming Nov. 2 congressional elections, the Tea Party has backed some 138 candidates – every single one a Republican.

In a conference call with journalists, NAACP President and CEO Benjamin T. Jealous applauded some Tea Party factions for taking the first steps to ensure that racists and bigots do not corrupt the movement's credibility.

"These are welcome first steps," he said. "They promote diversity and acknowledge the inherent perception problem that plagues the Tea Party: that while many of its leaders are motivated by common conservative budget and governance concerns, for too long they have tolerated others who espouse racism and xenophobia and, in some instances, are formally associated with organiSations like the Council of Conservative Citizens - the direct lineal descendant of the White Citizens Council."

However, he said, this work is incomplete.

"These groups and individuals are out there, and we ignore them at our own peril. They are speaking at Tea Party events, recruiting at rallies and in some cases remain in the Tea Party leadership itself," he said.

"The danger is not that the majority of Tea Party members share their views, but that left unchecked, these extremists might indirectly influence the direction of the Tea Party and therefore the direction of our country: moving it backward and not forward."

In a telephone news conference Wednesday, the NAACP endorsed a report by the Kansas City-based Institute for Research and Education on Human Rights, an independent civil rights advocacy organisation. The report, "Tea Party Nationalism", details various associations between Tea Party organisations and acknowledged hate groups in the United States.

"The Tea Party movement has unleashed a still inchoate political movement who are, in their numerical majority, angry middle-class white people who believe their country, their nation, has been taken from them," the report says.

While many Tea Partiers joined the movement out of genuine concern for the well-being of the country, there is a substantial body of evidence suggesting that professional lobbying firms, mostly in Washington, D.C., have provided many of the Tea Party's organising and publicity skills, and that wealthy individuals and corporations have made substantial money contributions to the movement.

In an addendum, the report provides details of local Tea Party leaders who the report's authors say have "direct ties to white supremacist groups".

The report says: "The TeaParty.org faction is led by the executive director of the Minuteman Project, a nativist organization that has in the past been associated with the murder of migrant Mexican workers as part of its vigilante 'border operations.' Roan Garcia-Quintana, 'advisor and media spokesman' for the 2010 Tax Day Tea Party and member of ResistNet, also serves on the National Board of Directors of the Council of Conservative Citizens (CofCC), the lineal descendent of the Council of White Citizens. In Texas, Wood County Tea Party leader Karen Pack was once listed as an 'official supporter' of Thom Robb's Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, a modern-day white supremacist organization."

The report examines the six national organisational networks the authors conclude are at the core of the Tea Party movement: FreedomWorks Tea Party, 1776 Tea Party, Tea Party Nation, Tea Party Patriots, ResistNet, and Tea Party Express.

It says that leaders of all but one - FreedomWorks, a lobbying group in Washington headed by Dick Armey, a former Republican House majority leader - have raised questions about President Barack Obama's birth certificate or have ties to white supremacist groups.

Jealous said that, in backing the report: "We're not attacking the Tea Party. We're not calling the Tea Party racist. We are asking them to repudiate the racists in their midst. We have challenged Democratic Party in the same way. We challenged Republicans when they embraced the old Dixiecrats."

But not everyone agrees. One who doesn't is Bruce Fein, a well-known conservative lawyer who served as an associate deputy attorney general in the Department of Justice under President Ronald Reagan. He told IPS, "The British had their Papal Plots, Joe McCarthy had his Communists, and now the NAACP has its ostensible racists as scapegoats to distract attention from serious issues."

He added, "The glorious civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s was chronically maligned by ad hominem attacks on its leadership and their associations based on flimsy or concocted evidence. It is disturbing to see the NAACP parrot the demagoguery that was employed against it."

The national attention sparked by the NAACP call this summer for the Tea Party to repudiate racist elements within the group inspired the Tea Party leadership to purge some outspoken racist elements, including Tea Party Express chairman Mark Williams.

The report concludes that members of groups such as the Council of Conservative Citizens (CCC) - once known as the segregationist White Citizens Councils - have infiltrated tea party chapters. The CCC is opposed to actions designed to "mix the races of mankind". It also notes that contributors to Stormfront.org," a white nationalist Web site, have written of "infiltrating" Tea Party events.

ARE HATE CRIME LAWS LEGALIZING TREASON?

By Jeff Gates
November 20, 2009
Courtesy Of The Opinion-Maker

Winning wars in the Information Age largely depends on winning the battle for public opinion. Thus the opinion-shaping role of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) when it attacked a high profile California professor for his criticism of Israeli policy in Palestine.

That ADL intimidation campaign successfully chilled debate on campuses nationwide during several time-critical months while a new president, promising the hope of change, reassessed U.S.-Israeli relations. His only change—endorsing more Israeli settlements on Palestinian land—quashed any hope of peace.

This ADL silencing strategy offers a microcosm of how the U.S. was induced to war in Iraq based on false intelligence. From the provocation of September 11, 2001 until the invasion of March 2003, war-planners ignored, dismissed or sought to silence anyone critical of the spurious premises offered for war.

Only later did we discover that the intelligence was fixed around a preset agenda. Even now, Americans are unaware that the U.S.-led invasion had long been an Israeli goal.

In similar fashion, an ADL campaign silenced on-campus criticism of Israel’s December 2008 assault on Gaza. At the University of California Santa Barbara, ADL-initiated charges were lodged against sociology Professor William Robinson. The disciplinary action dragged on until June 24th when 100 professors and 20 department heads demanded an end to all proceedings.

By then the damage was done—to the reputation of Professor Robinson, to academic freedom at the University of California and to national security as this campaign silenced academics countrywide. While Robinson’s reputation can be restored, the damage to national security is irreparable.

Manipulating Thought

The ADL and the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles coordinated the assault on Robinson after he shared with students from his globalization website a photo essay critical of Israel. The essay had circulated for weeks on the Internet.

Aaron Ettenberg, a member of the Faculty Senate Charges Committee, collaborated with Santa Barbara Rabbi Arthur Gross-Schaefer who reviled Robinson in the local community and urged—along with the ADL—that he be disciplined by the university for his “anti-Semitic” behavior.

Chancellor Henry Yang was subjected to threats to withhold funding featuring a campaign led by ADL National Director Abe Foxman and Rabbi Marvin Heir from the Wiesenthal Center.

Professor Ettenberg had served the previous two years as president of the local chapter of B’nai B’rith, an ADL affiliate. Rabbi Gross-Schaefer was director of the local chapter of Hillel, an on-campus ADL affiliate.

Mark Yudof, president of the University of California, opted not to intervene even as this silencing campaign attracted international attention. Yudof’s wife, Judith, is the immediate past international president of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism representing 760 synagogues. She is also a director of Hillel.

As with the dominance of Jewish Zionists among neoconservative war-planners, the pro-Israeli bias was all-pervasive. Richard Blum chairs the statewide Board of Regents for the University of California. His wife, U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein, chairs the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. What was their reaction as this professor was silenced? Silence.

Coincidence or Faith-Based Coordination?

Would a professor and a local rabbi have risked their careers and their reputations absent their confidence that—based on the shared bias of university administrators and government officials—they could intimidate with impunity? Absent such implied support, would this silencing operation have dragged on for so long?

Absent their silence—with its tacit approval—what might have been the impact of campus criticism when Israel’s assault on the captive population of Gaza left 1300 dead, one-third reportedly women and children? Those complicit in this silencing campaign knew the impact on public opinion of student protests against the Vietnam War—particularly on California campuses.

Those concerned about anti-Semitism must explain how this broadly coordinated intimidation campaign was allowed to succeed. In the same way that public opinion was manipulated prior to an invasion that launched the Global War on Terrorism, this campaign sought to deny students the facts required to understand Israel’s role in provoking that terror.

Absent access to facts, how can the U.S. preserve a system of self-governance founded on the premise of informed consent? Without facts, how can national security be protected from those who “fix” intelligence in order to deploy the U.S. military for the interests of a foreign nation?

Unless those complicit are held accountable, how will American youth learn the essential role of free and open debate on topics of direct relevance to their lives?

In a representative system of government, the greatest threat to liberty is manipulation of the facts required for informed citizen participation. Anyone who cherishes freedom should be alarmed at the ongoing success of such manipulation and outraged that its common source traces to a purported ally.

Psychological warfare targets knowledge as a means to manipulate thought, opinion and emotion (the “hearts and minds”) and thereby influence behavior. At the center of such disinformation is the displacement of facts with false beliefs meant to prod decision-making toward a preset goal.

Thus the false reports of Iraqi WMD, Iraqi ties to Al Qaeda, Iraqi mobile biological weapons laboratories and so forth. Thus the high profile assault on a high-profile center of learning to silence a professor who threatened to replace manipulated beliefs with confirmed facts.

Where U.S. policies toward Israel are at stake, facts are routinely suppressed to shape debate. Such strategic deceit systematically undermines U.S. national security.

Treason in Plain Sight

Intimidation campaigns have long been a key tool for organized crime and for those whose undisclosed agenda can succeed only when shielded from public scrutiny. Those complicit in such “psy-ops” know their agenda could not prevail in an open debate. They also know that if their treachery is detected they face charges of treason, a capital crime.

That’s why this form of treason instead targets knowledge to corrupt the facts required for informed choice. That focus denies those targeted a meaningful choice while leaving intact the appearance of open debate. Meanwhile the perpetrators seek refuge behind the very freedoms they undermine—freedom of speech, press, assembly and religion.

In this case, pro-Israeli operatives silenced on-campus criticism of Israel while Israel committed dozens of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Evidence of those crimes was depicted in the Internet-posted photo essay that the ADL attacked as “anti-Semitic.”

What was the strategic result? That assault on Gaza marked yet another violent provocation guaranteed to catalyze a violent reaction (aka “terrorism”), adding plausibility to the narrative of “militant Islam.” The result made the U.S. appear guilty by its association with this criminality.

We then compounded our complicity by covering up the facts when the Congress, dominated by the Israel lobby, overwhelmingly approved a resolution portraying as “irredeemably biased” a chronicle of those war crimes in “The Goldstone Report,” a comprehensive account by an eminent Jewish jurist. [See How the Israel Lobby Took Control of U.S. Foreign Policy http://criminalstate.com/2009/07/how-the-israel-lobby-took-control-of-us-foreign-policy/]

The U.S. was doubly damaged. We not only discredited ourselves, we also endangered our national security by condoning criminality destined to provoke more violence directed at our troops.

When such psy-ops campaigns are detected, defenders of democracy must fight back by making the perpetrators transparent and their common motivation apparent. This is how Israel wages war on the U.S. from inside the U.S.—by deceiving us to wage its wars and by provoking others to hate us due to our alliance with religious extremists and their apartheid policies.

Duplicity has long been a weapon deployed to “wage war by way of deception.” That’s the operative motto of the Mossad, the intelligence and foreign operations branch of the Jewish nationalists who have dominated Israeli politics since a Christian-Zionist president erred in 1948 by recognizing as a legitimate “state” this enclave of Jewish extremists and ultra-nationalists.

Israel specializes in what the Pentagon calls unconventional warfare. Such warfare is only “unconventional” for the targeted population (us). For militant Zionists, this is how war is waged. When your numbers are few and your ambitions vast, deceit becomes an essential force-multiplier.

In the Information Age, why would anyone expect war to be waged in any way other than by deception? Where else but in plain sight could such warfare be waged?

For freedom to prevail against such psy-ops requires a shift in strategic focus. A robust defense would make this manipulation transparent in real time before deception can work its intended impact on public opinion.

The dominance of pro-Israelis in mainstream media complicates that task. Media complicity was essential to succeed in the deceit that took the U.S. to war and that now seeks to obscure Israeli war crimes.

A Special Relationship with Fanatics

The Pentagon warned six decades ago that Jewish extremists sought military and economic dominance over the entire Middle East. As the Joint Chiefs of Staff cautioned Harry Truman:

“All stages of this program are equally sacred to the fanatical concepts of the Jewish leaders. The program is openly admitted by some leaders, and has been privately admitted to United States officials by responsible leaders of the presently dominant Jewish group—The Jewish Agency.”

Other than religious fanatics, who would deny Americans—including college students—the facts required to make informed choices on an issue as critical as taking the U.S. to war in the Middle East? Other than pro-Israeli publishers and broadcast media owners, who would have the motivation to report as “facts” the phony intelligence that was fixed around Israeli goals?

If not Israel and its Zionist advocates—both Christians and Jews—who would have the means, motive, opportunity and, importantly, the stable nation state intelligence required to corrupt the intelligence that took the U.S. to war? Or to silence academic critics just when those who induced the invasion of Iraq intensified their efforts to expand this war to Iran and now Pakistan?

If the behavior described is not treason, what is? If this is treason, why have those complicit not been charged? Is Professor Ettenberg still employed by the university? If so, why? Have rabbis Gross-Schaefer and Heir been dismissed from their positions of influence? If not, why not?

Why hasn’t the ADL’s Abe Foxman been indicted? Did he confer with the Yudoffs during this silencing campaign? Has a federal grand jury been impaneled to consider charges of treason? Foxman was invited to the White House for the October 28th signing of the ADL’s “model hate crimes” bill. Will that federal legislation now be deployed to lawfully intimidate critics?

Have mainstream publishers and media owners been investigated for their complicity in this national scale fraud on public opinion? If not, why not? Is the Federal Communications Commission moving to revoke the broadcast licenses of those who used the public airwaves to deceive the public? If not, why not?

Are news reports correct that an investment firm run by Richard Blum made more than $100 million on the rising value of its stock in a top defense contractor? Did his firm also invest in media outlets that sold us this war?

In an irony of epic proportions, ADL’s amendment to federal hate crimes law was tacked onto an appropriations bill for the Department of Defense. Will the ADL now seek to portray as “anti-Semitic” those who document for a long-deceived military the common source of the psy-ops that took U.S. forces to war in the Middle East?

Will those who repeat the Joint Chiefs’ warning about religious fanatics be targeted for federal prosecution? Will allegations of hate be deployed to silence debate? Is treason now lawful?

Jeff Gates is author of Guilt By Association, Democracy at Risk and The Ownership Solution. Author, educator, attorney, merchant banker and adviser to policy-makers worldwide and U.S. Veteran.

Jeff was counsel to the U.S. Senate Committee on Finance (1980-87) working for Democrat Russell Long, son of Louisiana Governor and U.S. Senator Huey P. Long. Specialist in employee benefits law—pensions, 401(k) plans, stock options, employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs), et.al. Tax-qualified employee benefit plans accounted for $17 trillion in assets (April 2007) and more than half the funds in the hands of institutional investors. As of 2007, ESOPs were in place in 11,500 firms nationwide, covering 10% of the U.S. workforce and holding $800 billion in assets.

Law practice w/ former Senators Russell Long, Democrat of Louisiana and Paul Laxalt, Republican of Nevada, chairman of Ronald Reagan’s presidential campaigns.

The ADL’s Hate Crimes Legislation

Americans again find themselves waging a costly and unnecessary war induced by false intelligence 'fixed' around the expansionist goals of Greater Israel. With transparency, a long-deceived global public will grasp how Americans were deceived six decades ago by an enclave of religious fanatics.

By Jeff Gates.
First Published 2009-08-04,
Last Updated 2009-08-04 11:51:40
Courtesy of Middle-East-Online

The Anti-Defamation League boasts that its model hate crimes statute inspired changes to law in 45 states and the District of Columbia. The ADL claimed another victory in July when the US Senate approved a hate crime statute similar to one approved in April by the House of Representatives. The slight differences will be resolved in the fall when President Barack Obama promised he will sign the ADL-crafted legislation into law.

In Congressional testimony on the Hate Crimes Prevention Act, Attorney General Eric Holder conceded the lack of evidence that hate crimes are not being prosecuted by the states. The US Commission on Civil Rights opposed the legislation, describing ADL’s model statute “a menace to civil liberties.” So what gives here? What, really, is the ADL’s agenda?

ADL was founded in 1913 by B’nai B’rith (“children of the covenant”) to oppose anti-Semitism. According to its website, the ADL now opposes any bias that may “tear at the fabric of our society and fragment communities.” Its model statute includes bias based not just on race, color, religion, national origin and gender but also, with this bill, disability, sexual orientation and gender identity.

With each new category, the ranks of potential ADL allies expands. Yet even while mobilizing opposition to anti-Jewish bias, ADL argues that anti-Semitism must also include criticism of Israel.

In describing this sleight-of-hand, Senator Carl Levin explained that the ADL-inspired statute targets “bias-motivated crimes” where there is “evidence of speech, beliefs or expressive conduct.” Where a defendant claims an absence of bias, the House bill allows impeachment of that claim with evidence of “expressions or associations.”

Bias alone is not a federal crime. At least not yet. While free speech is protected (sort of), bias-motivated crimes will soon be authorized for federal prosecution. Americans henceforth had best beware of their speech, beliefs, associations and “expressive conduct.” While there’s no sign as yet of the federal Thought Police, the statute authorizes the hiring of additional personnel to “prevent and respond to alleged violations.”

If a state jury acquits, federal prosecutors can try defendants again for the same offense. While not technically Constitution-prohibited double jeopardy—due to the presence of dual sovereigns (state and federal)—the chilling effect, as intended, is palpable and real.

The Department of Justice can intervene when “necessary to secure substantial justice.” In practical effect, the ADL statute transforms the perception of bias into a “currency” that can be deployed to silence critics of Israel.

The intimidation campaign mounted against University of California professor William Robinson showed the lengths to which the ADL will go to stifle critics even when—as in Gaza—Israeli conduct would be considered racist and imperialist anywhere but in the US [See “Treason in Plain Sight?” and “The ADL Thought Police.”]

With this legislation, critics of the Zionist state (or Zionism) could find themselves victims of an ADL intimidation initiative sold to Congress and the White House as a means to protect victims of prejudice. Declaring in its testimony “we are unimpressed,” the US Commission on Civil Rights warned that the legislation “will do little good and a great deal of harm” under cover of an ADL-lobbied statute that, as the Commission says: “purports to protect civil rights.”

Identity Politics and the ADL

Hate crimes legislation is the latest face on the identity group politics that has fragmented US society since the 1960s. Its roots are found in the “Frankfurt School” of the 1920s, a transnational network of social critics frustrated that class warfare failed to gain global traction after the Russian revolution of 1917. Drawing on the class oppression of Karl Marx and the emotional repression of Sigmund Freud, victim group identity became a means to catalyze social solidarity that—like class identity—would supersede national identity.

As identity politics became a stand-in for class politics, prejudice displaced class as the focal point for reform. With enactment of the ADL’s model statute, reform means federal monitoring of “expressive conduct” backed by the threat of a lengthy prison term.

Over four decades, a failed theory of political alienation was replaced with a psychological theory of social and sexual alienation. As repression shifted from the economy to society and sexuality, a litany of liberation movements emerged. With each new group’s claim of bias, prejudice and repression, the ADL gained more potential recruits for its opposition to “anti-Semitism.”

Out of this fusion of disaffection, activism and academia emerged “Critical Theory” whose goals remain obscure though its advocates spawned “special studies programs” on campuses nationwide: African American, Native American, Latino, Jewish, feminist, gay and so forth. Akin to the endless debate typical of a yeshiva, ceaseless social critique emerged as both means and end while identity group theorizing became a career path for academics.

From this intellectual lineage emerged charges of an “Imperial America” ever eager for another conquest and led by a succession of Oil War fascists in need of sensitivity training. As the ranks of the repressed grew, the commitment to identity groups deepened while allegiance to the US—and to democratic values—began a steady decline

With identity politics came not only a fragmented society but also a fractured national psyche. Rather than devotion to community and country, loyalty shifted to parts less than the whole. Allegiance flowed to like-minded sub-groups that often reflected a shared personal bias. Group-reinforced dedication to that identity bred intolerance and arrogance. Why endure the views of others when you are certain your views are correct?

National self-criticism was catalyzed by a series of confidence-shattering assassinations. Those iconic murders undercut an entire nation’s self-assurance as the American psyche deteriorated into self-doubt and an erosion of faith in self-governance. The loss of a costly and unnecessary war in Southeast Asia further sapped the ‘Can Do’ spirit of a post-WWII populace.

Duplicity, Hate and the Criminal State

Fast-forward four decades and Americans again find themselves waging a costly and unnecessary war induced by false intelligence “fixed” around the expansionist goals of Greater Israel. As the common source of that deception comes clearly into focus, critics of Israel are forced to contend with a federal statute that’s a recipe for repression—traceable to the same source those critics now cite at their peril.

Rather than a campus-by-campus silencing campaign, ADL and affiliates of this covenant can mobilize the Department of Justice to quell criticism nationwide. Or, as stated in the ADL model statute approved by the House: “to prevent and respond to alleged violations.”

Hate has long been a currency used by those who proposed this statute. Many Jews are critical of Israeli policy. Those who dare to speak out are routinely described as “self-hating.” Non-Jewish critics are dismissed by the ADL with one or more toxic smears: anti-Semite, Jew-hater, neo-Nazi or Holocaust-denier—each category deserving of hate.

ADL extremists no more represent the broader Jewish community than Christian Zionists John Hagee and Pat Robertson represent the Christian community or radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr represents the broader Muslim community. Extremism is a trait that merits the hatred of freedom seekers worldwide.

With its deceitful statute, the ADL seeks to induce identity groups to empathize with anti-Semitism while evoking hate to obscure Zionism’s true goals. Much as the politics of class warfare failed to gain traction nine decades ago, the politics of hate will also fail.

With transparency, a long-deceived global public will grasp how Americans were deceived six decades ago by an enclave of religious fanatics they naively sought to befriend and defend only to see their behavior tear at the social fabric and fragment communities.

To betray, you must first befriend. To defraud, you must first create trust. Accountability for this trans-generational duplicity will commence as the ADL’s true motives become transparent and its supporters apparent. The restoration of national security requires that those complicit in this covenant—including cooperative lawmakers and their staffs—are held accountable for their support of this statute.

Jeff Gates is a widely acclaimed author, attorney, investment banker, educator and consultant to government, corporate and union leaders worldwide. Gates’ latest book is Guilt By Association—How Deception and Self-Deceit Took America to War (2008). His previous books include Democracy at Risk: Rescuing Main Street From Wall Street and The Ownership Solution: Toward a Shared Capitalism for the 21st Century. For two decades, he was an adviser to policy-makers worldwide. He was also Counsel to the US Senate Finance Committee (1980-87).