The Arab/Muslim lobby in the US

FrontPage magazine has a must read piece today. With all of the fuss by ex-president Carter and others about the so-called `Jewish lobby', the Arab/Muslim lobby is seldom mentioned. But it is becoming increasingly more powerful, organized and well financed.

Here's a little appetizer:

According to terrorism expert Steven Emerson, “Assessing the influence and breadth of the Arab/Muslim lobby would be a difficult thing to do, since the metrics for assessing such things are not easily available. The lobby’s real strength is felt on the local level, where its members receive community awards, participate in human relations councils, change the local educational curricula, persuade school districts to give them holidays off, and get local police and statewide officials to attend their events. Nationally, their influence is felt at the State Department in terms of their being invited to briefings, sponsored on road trips abroad, etc. The one recent time where they actually exacted an influence on President Bush was in persuading him to drop the use of the term ‘Islamo-fascism.’”

While the Arab lobby has a few friends in Congress today, its effect is felt mainly as a result of its joint efforts with organizations like the American Civil Liberties Union to dilute anti-terror measures. The lobby, says Emerson, “is mainly in the process of building up a grassroots network around the United States, with the anticipation that, abetted by growing demographics, it will be in a position of political influence in the future.”

A must read for Joshua's Army members.