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DHS
and the Dearborn Muslim Community: A Relationship on the Rocks?
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CAIR
Michigan's website includes this exhortation to make CAIR the first
phone call of people contacted by the FBI. Is that what DHS wants?
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On January 13, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson trekked
to Dearborn, Michigan, where he spoke
to students and law enforcement at the University of Michigan – Dearborn
about the department's efforts to engage the Muslim community. He also
met privately with student leaders in a meeting closed to media.
Reportedly, Johnson did not
meet with leaders of the local Muslim community. He did say that he
was "open
to the idea of meeting with faith leaders in the future," but it
still seems odd, considering DHS billed the talk's subject as community
engagement.
It's possible the secretary was simply too busy. He may have thought
the students were more of a priority, given the youth of so many people
attracted to ISIS and other terrorist groups, and felt he could not take
the additional time needed to meet with community leaders.
Or perhaps there is more to it. Johnson's message included this plea
to Muslims: "Terrorist organizations... seek to pull your youth into
the pit of violent extremism. Help us to help you stop this... If you see
someone turning toward violence, say something. Say something to
law enforcement, or to one of your community or religious
leaders."
Contrast the secretary's comments with a poster on the website of the Council on
American-Islamic Relations' Michigan chapter, exhorting readers, "If
the FBI contacts you, contact us." The poster supplies
CAIR-Michigan's telephone
number, 248-559-2247. While the FBI is part of the Department of Justice
rather than the Department of Homeland Security, the message is
consistent with CAIR's oppositional
attitude regarding government efforts to counter
violent Islamism, including its opposition
to a bill that would fund DHS counter-extremism efforts. The Arab
American Institute has likewise been critical
of government efforts to counter "violent extremism."
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Imam
Mohammad Ali Elahi, leader of the Islamic House of Wisdom in Dearborn
Heights, denies the connection between Islam and Islamist violence.
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Local Muslim religious leaders like Imam Mohammad Ali Elahi, leader of
the Islamic House of Wisdom in Dearborn Heights, have also denied
a connection between Islam and the crimes of violent Islamists.
Unlike, for example, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who has
called for a religious
revolution
within Islam, or the recently launched Muslim Reform Movement,
which openly states it is in a "battle for the soul of Islam,"
Elahi speaks of Islam as a victim of Islamist terrorists and urges,
"Don't blame Islam for the evil actions of its enemies."
A group that tells its
constituents, 'If the FBI contacts you, contact us,' isn't the right
partner for U.S. law enforcement.
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Johnson
parroted the administration's party line, "The very essence of the
Islamic faith is peace," but also called on the community to speak
up against extremism in order to counter ISIS. The administration has
received pushback on the latter request from groups like CAIR, and it
also seems contrary to the message of Elahi and other religious leaders
in the Dearborn area.
For all the administration's bending over backward to include
Muslim groups like CAIR and its fellow travelers within the Muslim
community, perhaps the latters' efforts to obstruct government
anti-terror efforts are beginning to register within the administration.
Maybe the secretary thought a group that tells its constituents, "If
the FBI contacts you, contact us," wasn't the right partner for a
talk urging listeners, "if you see something, say something to law
enforcement." Perhaps Johnson decided the leadership of the local
Muslim community in and around Dearborn is a bit too radicalized and
uncooperative to make engagement with them productive, and has written
them off as a practical reality.
Johanna Markind is associate
counselor at the Middle East Forum
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