CAIR does pre-emptive damage control

MSNBC's report on the mass shootings at Ft Hood, Texas, by Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan includes this nugget:

Noting the Arabic nature of the gunman’s name, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a Washington interest group, condemned “this cowardly attack in the strongest terms possible and ask that the perpetrators be punished to the full extent of the law.”

”No political or religious ideology could ever justify or excuse such wanton and indiscriminate violence,” the council said in a statement. “The attack was particularly heinous in that it targeted the all-volunteer army that protects our nation. American Muslims stand with our fellow citizens in offering both prayers for the victims and sincere condolences to the families of those killed or injured.”

Now, this statement is entirely unobjectionable and in fact commendable prima facie. It's the statement's implication that is remarkable.

CAIR is implicitly saying that it's plausible to believe that the murders have a direct connection to Islam because the murderer has an Arabic (read, "Muslim") name. As I recall, in the past CAIR either defended Islamic terrorists or pretended that such deeds done by Muslims had nothing to do with Islam.

This is pretty interesting because CAIR is a highly suspect organization.

Senator Charles Schumer (Democrat, New York) describes it as an organization "which we know has ties to terrorism."[3] Senator Dick Durbin (Democrat, Illinois) observes that CAIR is "unusual in its extreme rhetoric and its associations with groups that are suspect."[4] Steven Pomerantz, the FBI's former chief of counterterrorism, notes that "CAIR, its leaders, and its activities effectively give aid to international terrorist groups."[5] The family of John P. O'Neill, Sr., the former FBI counterterrorism chief who perished at the World Trade Center, named CAIR in a lawsuit as having "been part of the criminal conspiracy of radical Islamic terrorism"[6] responsible for the September 11 atrocities. Counterterrorism expert Steven Emerson calls it "a radical fundamentalist front group for Hamas."[7] ...

Perhaps the most obvious problem with CAIR is the fact that at least five of its employees and board members have been arrested, convicted, deported, or otherwise linked to terrorism-related charges and activities. ...

... CAIR also leapt to bin Laden's defense, denying his responsibility for the twin East African embassy bombings. CAIR's Hooper saw these explosions resulting from "misunderstandings of both sides."[57] Even after the September 11 atrocity, CAIR continued to protect bin Laden, stating only that "if [note the "if"] Osama bin Laden was behind it, we condemn him by name."[58] Not until December 2001, when bin Laden on videotape boasted of his involvement in the attack, did CAIR finally acknowledge his role.

CAIR has also consistently defended other radical Islamic terrorists. Rather than praise the conviction of the perpetrators of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, it deemed this "a travesty of justice."[59] It labeled the extradition order for suspected Hamas terrorist Mousa Abu Marzook "anti-Islamic" and "anti-American."[60] CAIR has co-sponsored Yvonne Ridley, the British convert to Islam who became a Taliban enthusiast and a denier that Al-Qaeda was involved in 9-11.[61] When four U.S. civilian contractors in Falluja were (in CAIR's words) "ambushed in their SUV's, burned, mutilated, dragged through the streets, and then hung from a bridge spanning the Euphrates River," CAIR issued a press release that condemned the mutilation of the corpses but stayed conspicuously silent on the actual killings.[62]

During the 2005 trial of Sami Al-Arian, accused of heading Palestinian Islamic Jihad in the United States, Ahmed Bedier of CAIR's Florida branch emerged as Al-Arian's effective spokesman, providing sound bytes to the media, trying to get his trial moved out of Tampa, commenting on the jury selection, and so on.[63]

More broadly, TheReligionofPeace.com website pointed out that "of the more than 3100 fatal Islamic terror attacks committed in the last four years, we have only seen CAIR specifically condemn 18."[64]

The many embedded links in this cite didn't transfer over, but this is all documented on the linked page.