Canada's National Post reports today the former celebrity folk-rock singer and convert to Islam Cat Stevens, now known as Yusuf Islam, was the guest of honor at a 1998 fundraising dinner in Toronto for The Jerusalem Fund For Human Services. That's an organization identified by the Canadian government as a "front" for the Palestinian terrorist organization Hamas. Hamas is responsible for numerous suicide bombings in Israel. The Canadian intelligence on Stevens just might be salient to U.S. mainstream media outlets and Lefties who've have had a field day squawking about him being denied entry to the U.S. recently because of government security concerns.
Yusuf Islam, the British singer formerly known as Cat Stevens, was the guest of honour at a Toronto fundraising dinner hosted by an organization that has since been identified by the Canadian government as a "front" for the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas.In a videotape of the 1998 event obtained by the National Post, Mr. Islam describes Israel as a "so-called new society" created by a "so-called religion" and urges the audience to donate to the Jerusalem Fund for Human Services to "lessen the suffering of our brothers and sisters in Palestine and the Holy Land."
The Jerusalem Fund is one of four "fronts" named in a secret Privy Council Office memo that was sent to Jean Chretien, then prime minister, on May 23, 2000, discussing what it called groups that "have unsavoury links with terrorism.
"In a limited number of cases, fundraising in support of violent foreign struggles takes place in Canada through the cover of ethnic, religious or community-based associations and groups, lobbying and even criminal activity," the report says.
"Front groups operating in Canada include the Jerusalem Fund for Human Services (Hamas Front), the World Tamil Movement (Tamil Tigers Front), the Canadian Kurdish Information Network (Kurdistan Workers Party Front) and the Babbar Khalsa (a Sikh extremist front)."
Hamas, also known as the Islamic Resistance Movement, is responsible for most of the suicide bombings against Israelis. Canada has outlawed Hamas under federal anti-terrorism legislation, making it illegal to support the group.
Ride that Peace Train, brother Yusuf, ya betcha.
UPDATE: Here is Stevens' sanctimonious self-defense in today's LA Times (free reg. may be required). It is greatly at odds with his on-video Jew- and Israel-bashing, and the Canadian government's assessment as a Hamas "front" of the Jerusalem Fund for Human Services, with which he was closely associated.
Hat tip for National Post piece: Canadian blogger Kate, at Small Dead Animals.
Posted by Matt Rosenberg at September 28, 2004 12:25 PM
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