Editor's Note: Tom Quiggin raises questions about the competence and possible politicization of the Ottawa Police, given its apparently warm relations with known Muslim Brotherhood front groups, most notably the National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM), formerly CAIR-CAN, whose parent organization Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) has been identified as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terrorism funding case in the USA. The incurious attitude of the Ottawa Police about the background of its Muslim partners in outreach may hinder their investigations into gang violence and Islamic extremism, between which there appears to be some crossover.
The photo of Amira Elghawaby draws attention to the issue of the Ottawa Police and its multiple interactions with NCCM/CAIR CAN. This includes hate crime presentations at the Ottawa Main Mosque, whose Imam is a member of a listed terrorist group (IUMS) which advocates segregation and wife beating. The photo below was tweeted out by Constable Sue Wright of the Ottawa Police Service with the attached comment that said “@AmiraElghawaby speaking about local efforts to encourage reporting hate crimes.” Constable Wright self-identifies as being part of the Ottawa Police Service Outreach and Recruitment section. This photo raises so many questions, while also calling into question the competency of the Chief of the Ottawa Police Force and the Mayor of Ottawa. At the time the photo was taken, Amira Elghawaby was the Director of Communications for the National Council of Canadian Muslims, formerly known as Council of American Islamic Relations Canada or CAIR CAN. She is also the Editorial Advisor for Muslim Link and has written stories for the Globe and Mail, the Toronto Star, CBC-Radio, Rabble and the Middle East Times.
The slide being shown at the top of the photo refers to University of Ottawa student Hailey DeJong and OC Transpo Driver Alain Charette.
NCCM/CAIR CAN – The National Council for Canadian Muslims The NCCM was formerly known as the CAIR CAN or the Council for American Islamic Relations Canada or CAIR CAN. NCCM/CAIR CAN has a parent organization identified as CAIR USA, based in Washington DC. In this extract from a 2003 publication titled “A Journalist’s Guide to Islam” belonging to CAIR-CAN the following statement says:
“CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations) This Washington-based organization is CAIR-CAN’s parent organization. It has an email newsletter for the news media, providing news releases and background materials about important Islamic events. It is worth receiving. Tel: 202-488-8787 Fax: 202-488-0833 Email: webmaster@cair-net.org, Website: www.caircan.org (A Journalist’s Guide to Islam (version 2003) Conceived by the Council on American Islamic Relations Canada.” Published by Islamic Social Services Association Canada.”
NCCM/CAIR CAN was formed specifically to support CAIR USA. Their own statement on this matter says:
“In 1996, a group of concerned Canadian Muslims started an informal network in Canada to work with the Washington-based CAIR, an organization well known among Canadian Muslims since 1994. In the spring of 1997, CAIR-Montreal was formed, and was soon after replaced by CAIR Ottawa. In 2000, CAIR CAN was incorporated as a Canadian organization speaking out for Canada’s Muslim population.”
CAIR USA, the parent organization, has been listed as a terrorist group by the United Arab Emirates. CAIR USA had also been identified as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Relief terrorism funding case, but their name was removed from the list of co-conspirators. The judge ruled, however, that “the government has produced ample evidence to establish the associations of CAIR, ISNA, NAIT, with the Islamic Association for Palestine, and with (terrorist group) Hamas. Hamas describes itself as being the one of the wings of Muslim Brotherhood in Palestine. It is a listed terrorist group in Canada. In May 2015, Muslim Brotherhood expert Dr. Lorenzo Vidino testified to the Standing Senate Committee on National Security and Defence in Ottawa. He stated that the number of major Muslim Brotherhood front groups in Canada was from eight to ten. The four front groups he identified by name were the Muslim Association of Canada, The National Council of Canadian Muslims, Islamic Relief Canada, and IRFAN Canada (now defunct and listed as a terrorist entity). Hailey DeJong and the Niqab Incident In May of 2016, a 20-year-old student from the University of Ottawa was verbally abused while wearing the niqab on an Ottawa City Bus. OC Transpo driver Alain Charette stepped in to stop the abuse. Muslim revert Hailey Dejong (@amirah_hailey) expressed her gratitude to the bus driver and took a selfie with him. The mainstream media picked up on the feel-good story which had a strong progressive element. Among those who picked it up were the CTV, the CBC, the Huffington Post, Radio-Canada, and the Ottawa Sun. The story died out almost immediately when more attention was focussed on the “victim” Hailey DeJong. As it turns out, Ms. DeJong was engaged to an individual who is, by her own statement, outside of Canada doing jihad. She now appears to be married to the same person who is/was a Syrian refugee. She states that he lives “abroad” but it is not clear how long he has lived abroad, or if he has ever been in Canada. She also states that he has been a refugee for six years due to President Assad of Syria (presumably a reference to the war in Syria). She became a Muslim revert in 2013 and began wearing hijab in 2014 but it is not clear when she started wearing a niqab.
Politicization and Depolicing The photo of Amira Elghawaby draws attention to the issue of the Ottawa Police and its multiple interactions with NCCM/CAIR CAN. This includes hate crime presentations at the Ottawa Main Mosque, whose Imam is a member of a listed terrorist group (IUMS) which advocates segregation and wife beating. It raises several questions:
Are the Mayor of Ottawa, the Chief of Police and the Ottawa Police Services Board aware of the fact that the parent organization of the NCCM/CAIR CAN is a listed terrorist group due to its Muslim Brotherhood linkages? CAIR USA was listed as it is seen as a proxy terror actor and front organisation.
Are the Mayor of Ottawa, the Chief of Police and the Ottawa Police Services Board aware of the fact that the NCCM/CAIR CAN has been identified as a Muslim Brotherhood front group in parliamentary testimony?
Why do the Mayor of Ottawa, the Chief of Police and the Ottawa Police Services Board only deal with Islamist groups and not others such as the Muslim Reform Movement, Muslims Facing Tomorrow or the Canadian Thinkers Forum?
What is the position of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police on the issue of police forces working with foreign listed terrorist groups operating in Canada? The Durham Regional Police Force retracted an invitation to the NCCM/CAIR CAN when they realized what the group was about. Yet the Ottawa Police Service appears happy to cooperate with them. In the USA, the FBI limited relations with CAIR USA due to their close linkages to extremism and terrorism.
Conclusions There appears to be a crossover between gang violence and Islamist extremism, as was shown in the shooting of Marwan and Ayyub Arab. Some of the extremism and violence has also been shown to have links to the Muslim Student Association groups at Algonquin College and the University of Ottawa. This includes students joining ISIS such as Algonquin student Khadar Khalib and University of Ottawa student John Maguire. The common linkage between groups such as Al Qaeda, ISIS, Boko Haram, the Abu Sayef Group and Hamas is at least two-fold. They share the common goals of establishing a global Islamic caliphate run under a Salafi interpretation of Sharia. The other commonality is that these groups were all founded by former members of the Muslim Brotherhood. Is it possible that anti-gang and anti-extremism operations in the Ottawa area are hindered by the politicization of the police department by the Mayor and the Police Chief?
This article was originally published by The Post Millenial on April 17, 2018, and can be viewed on their site by clicking here.