Farrakhan Demands Reparations from Jews

[Mediocrates]

From news article:

Louis Farrakhan recently sent a three-page letter along with two books to the heads of sixteen Jewish organizations. Dated June 24, 2010, the letter is resplendent with a crescent-and-moon flag and Farrakhan's impressive-sounding title ("National Representative of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad and the Nation of Islam"). In it, he announces that the books (volume two of The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews and Jews Selling Blacks: Slave Trade by American Jews) present

an undeniable record of Jewish anti-Black behavior, starting with the horror of the trans-Atlantic slave trade, plantation slavery, Jim Crow, sharecropping, the labor movement of the North and South, the unions and the misuse of our people that continues to this very moment.

Farrakhan challenges the recipients of his letter – who range politically from Jeremy Ben-Ami (of J-Street) to Lee Rosenberg (of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee) to Morton Klein (of the Zionist Organization of America) –

to find one act committed by me or those who follow me that has injured one Jewish person, stopped Jews from doing business, hindered their education, injured their families, sullied or desecrated their synagogues.

"You will not find one," declares Farrakhan, who then asks: "on what basis do you charge me and us as being 'anti-Semitic'?" Quite the contrary, Farrakhan avers, "we could now charge you with the most vehement anti-Black behavior in the annals of our history in America and the world. We could charge you with being the most deceitful so-called friend, while your history with us shows you have been our worst enemy." Farrakhan could also dwell on the fact that Jews are "sitting on top of the world in power, with riches and influence, while the masses of my people here in America, in the Caribbean, Central and South America and elsewhere in the world are in the worst condition of any member of the human family."

He could make these points, he notes, but he chooses not to: "I do not write this with vitriol, hatred, bitterness, or a spirit of vengeance." Instead, he hopes to establish ties with Jews: "I have pleaded with you over the years for a sensible, intelligent dialogue. You have rejected me." Despite prior failures, the publication of these two books inspires Farrakhan to try anew: "I again ask you for a dialogue."

For Farrakhan, dialogue equals reparations. Because Jews "are in a position to help me in the civilizing work that The Honorable Elijah Muhammad was given to do by Allah (God)." More specifically: "This is an offer asking you and the gentiles whom you influence to help me in the repair of my people from the damage that has been done by your ancestors to mine." In other words, after years of unsuccessfully demanding reparations for blacks from the U.S. government, he is now looking to Jews to make amends for their alleged past injustices.

Farrakhan presents this moment as both a unique opportunity for Jews ("This is a wonderful way of the present generation of Jews to escape the Judgment of Allah") and as an ultimatum:

you may either gather your forces for an all-out struggle against me, the Nation of Islam, and the truth that I and we speak and write, or as an intelligent and civilized people, we can sit down and carve out a way forward that can obliterate the stain of the past and render us, Jews and Blacks … in a new, honorable, and mutually respectful relationship.

Should Jews spurn this offer, Farrakhan threatens "disgrace and ruin":

should you choose to make our struggle to our people more difficult, then I respectfully warn you … that the more you fight and oppose me rather than help me to lift my people from their degraded state, Allah (God) and His Messiah will bring you and your people to disgrace and ruin and destroy your power and influence here and throughout the world.

He signs off with "Respectfully and Sincerely Submitted, The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, Servant to the Lost-Found Nation of Islam in the West."

[GratefulFred]

Hey Louis baby I'll give you a quarter for shining my shoes.

Fund raising must be really hurting.

[Mediocrates]

http://www.iabolish.org/index.php?op...5:static-pages

But it’s been almost two decades since Farrakhan’s abrupt and intriguing near-silence on the Jews-as-slavers matter. The silence was forced upon him because he was caught out covering up, excusing, or denying that Arab/Muslims were (and still are) enslaving blacks in Sudan and Mauritania. Farrakhan’s job is to convince Blacks that Jews are their enemies and that Islam is the path to freedom. But when Jewish and Black writers in or allied with, the American Anti-Slavery Group (AASG) documented the Arab/Islamic slave trade -- not only in the New York Times, but also widely in the Black press and on Black TV news shows, Farrakhan’s agenda was jeopardized. A fight ensured. The Times reported that Farrakhan exploded at a press conference when asked about his silence regarding Blacks serving Islamic masters. Farrakhan challenged the press: “Where is the proof? If slavery exists, why don’t you go as a member of the press and you look inside Sudan, and if you find it, then you come back and tell the American people what you found?” When two Baltimore Sun reporters, one black and one white, did just that, Louis Farrakhan took his “Jewish slavers” story and dove under the bed. Why is he now resurfacing? My guess is that he smells Jewish weakness, sees our vulnerability, or sees an opportunity for new funding. In the oily letter to the Jewish leaders, he suggests between the lines that he can be appeased for funds.


In response, ADL’s Foxman called Farrakhan’s anti-Semitism “obsessive, diabolical and unrestrained.” AJC called NOI’s latest publications “functional re-writes of … “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.” But it was Morton Klein of the ZOA who shifted to offense: Mort called on President Barak Obama to condemn Farrakhan’s “anti-Semitic” letter (good!), and reminded Farrakhan that “the slave trade that brought Africans to America in chain was largely a Muslim trade” and that “slavery of black Africans continues in some Muslim states to this day.”


We’re doing some historical research of our own. Stay tuned.
For documents and videos relating to the Farrakhan controversy, see www.iabolish.org


Charles Jacobs is the founder of the American Anti-Slavery Group, Sasha Giller is its current Director.