Our long-time reader and commenter Mark Spahn exchanged a series of entertaining and informative emails with Ibrahim “Honest Ibe” Hooper, the Communications Director for the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). The full exchange is reproduced below, followed by an afterword from Mr. Spahn.
Dear Mr. Ibrahim Hooper ihooper@cair.com:
Your press release
says that the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) is “the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization”. I have seen this assertion for years, so finally I tried looking for the evidence. Unfortunately, with my poor search skills, I was unable to find corroboration on your website cair.com. So please let me ask
| [1] | What is the nation’s second-largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization? | |
| [2] | By what measure is CAIR the largest such organization? By number of dues-paying members? By annual budget? | |
| [3] | Please point me to the evidence for CAIR being America’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization. |
— Mark Spahn (West Seneca, NY)
[Mr. Hooper:] What is your evidence that it is NOT?
Dear Mr. Hooper:
Thank you for your 8-word reply (“What is your evidence that it [CAIR] is NOT [the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization]?”).
Please excuse me for finding this response childish. It answers none of the three questions I asked. I have made no assertion about the size of CAIR, but you have, and have done so for years. Surely you and your members welcome the opportunity to demonstrate your prominence in your field.
Awaiting your reply, I remain
Puzzled,
Mark Spahn (West Seneca, NY)
[Mr. Hooper:] You [sic] question is based on the premise that our statement is false. It up to you to provide evidence of its falsity.
Dear Mr. Hooper:
Huh? My question about CAIR being the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization is based on the premise that you say it is, not on the premise that your statement is false. You make this assertion with your every press release, so surely you are prepared to answer reporters’ skeptical questions about how you came to your conclusion about CAIR’s size. Perhaps you will find it easier to answer the two other questions first: What organization is CAIR’s biggest rival, and by what criterion do you determine the size of an organization?
Please be serious. (And pardon the suspicion that you are kafir infiltrator who is subtlety making a mockery of CAIR’s apologetics. You are better than that.)
— Mark Spahn (West Seneca, NY)
[Mr. Hooper:] Jihad Watch? [quoting some recent comments by Mark Spahn at Jihad Watch:]
Dear Mr. Hooper:
Your two-word comment “Jihad Watch?” looks like a question, but it’s hard to interpret a question that contains no verb. Are you asking what Jihad Watch is? It’s a website where jihad fans discuss things. I think you would enjoy it, and I think with your connection to CAIR you would be an educational resource for this website, being able to clear up any misunderstands about CAIR (e.g., how big it is) or about Islam in general. This website is run by one Robert Spencer (I think of him as Imam Robert), whom I am sending a copy of this note to. Maybe he will encourage you to be an active participant. And perhaps he will even invite you to write an article about the size of CAIR. This will be right down your alley of fostering American-Islamic relations. (Why didn’t we think of this before? It’s all about bringing people together.)
— Mark Spahn (West Seneca, NY)
[Mr. Hooper:] “Show forgiveness, speak for justice and avoid the ignorant.” The Holy Quran, 7:199
Dear Mr. Hooper:
I don’t want to call you a Hindu or anything, but your answer (a scriptural quotation) sounds cryptically guru-like, requiring a great deal of interpretation. I will heed your parting advice, to show forgiveness and speak for justice, but referring to yourself as “ignorant” is far too modest. Please don’t think of yourself in this way. I forgive your failure to answer seemingly simple, straightforward questions about CAIR, which I interpret as your way to cover your embarrassment about your ignorance. But please don’t feel depressed about this; the sun will come up tomorrow.
— Mark Spahn (West Seneca, NY)
Afterword from Mr. Spahn:
A few afterthoughts on my dialogue yesterday with Ibrahim Hooper, whom the CAIR website lists as “the National Communications Director for the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR)”.
For the communications director of a national organization, Mr. Hooper (who holds “a master’s of art [sic] in journalism and mass communication”) is not a very good communicator. He is unable to answer simple, objective questions about his own organization. Could this incompetence be deliberate, what you would expect from an infidel Deep State within the CAIR organization? That doesn’t seem likely. Probably this is just an illustration of the Peter Principle, according to which “an employee is promoted based on their success in previous jobs until they reach a level at which they are no longer competent”.
His bio says, “As CAIR’s spokesman he appears frequently on national and international television programs to offer an Islamic perspective on current events or debate controversial issues.” Aha, so maybe his talents are not as a communicator but as a debater. I have not watched any of these debates on national and international television programs, but henceforth I’ll be on the lookout for them.
Actually, his seeming incompetence makes me feel sorry for him. Let’s get out our prayer mats and say a prayer for him: that if he is a Deep State saboteur within CAIR, his infidelity will not be discovered, and that if he is really as unskillful at his job as he seems, Allah (swt)* will grant him the talent to become a better communicator.
— Mark Spahn (West Seneca, NY)
| * | Background information:
SWT stands for an Arabic phrase meaning “Glory to Him, the Exalted”. Like the “alll JewS Dog” phrase on the Islamic State flag, this abbreviation was providentially chosen so that it will have meaning in English as well as in Arabic. It is like “God Squad”, but more kinetic: the SWT Team of fighters for Islam’s most dominant, domineering deity. |
Mark Spahn has a certain “je ne sais quoi” that is probably beyond CAIR’s comprehension.
Debate? from CAIR? Are you joking?
All their youtube stuff have “Comments disabled”
I heard Hooper on the radio right after 9/11 saying that Islam is against terrorism, but you have to be able to read the Koran in Arabic to know it.
All 19 of the 9/11 hijackers were Arab! What’s that word in Arabic to describe deceiving non-Muslims that is sanctioned in Islam?
Belated statement of the bloody obvious: the most populous majority- muslim states are Indonesia and Pakistan, where modern arabic (let alone the obscure version of the qu’ran) is little known or understood; therefore, the majority of muslims cannot understand it, even if some are forced to memorise it in madrassas.
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Mark Spahn,
Thank you for this hilarious exchange. I can’t believe it’s genuine!!! I’m strangely comforted knowing there’s someone out there challenging this nonsense with wit and skill.
In thinking further about my recent experience with Ibrahim “Honest Ibe” Hooper,
I have completely revised my opinion of him.
I began my interaction with him by asking him a simple question about his organization, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR): Why do you say that CAIR is “the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization”? Mr. Hooper could have simply answered the question, I would have said “Thank you”, and that would have been the end.
Instead, he “played” me, by giving me a nonsequitur answer he knew would prompt another question from me. And he kept doing this to prolong our back-and-forth dialogue. At each step, he gave an outrageous answer, and I became his dim-witted chump of a straightman, feeding him bland prompts for more comedic replies. This is very similar to the technique of the Jewish comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, who tricks “civilians” into being a sounding board for his comedy. And come to think of it, this type of comedy is a revival of the comedy of 70 years ago, when the singer Dean Martin fed innocent prompts to the manic comedian Jerry Lewis (look it up on YouTube).
So now I will no longer feel guilty if CAIR fires Ibrahim Hooper as its National Communications Director. This is probably what he is aiming for, to start a new career as the Islamic Sacha Baron Cohen, and make much more money. Yes Ibe, you tricked me, but I don’t hold it against you. You are not a mere hapless functionary promoted beyond your talents in a marginal Muslim organization. You are a comedy genius!