Memo To Sol Rieger Re: Your Article Attacking The Minister

From:   Jackie Muhammad

First, let me thank you for your article in Jewish Political News & Updates condemning Black leaders for meeting with Minister Farrakhan to plan the upcoming 20^th anniversary of the Million Man March. It will help promote the October 10, 2015, anniversary of the MMM to be held in Washington, DC. Nevertheless, the Jewish community’s obsession with Minister Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam borders on the absurd.

Why is it that the Jewish community, for whom you serve as a representative and a spokesman, is so obsessed with whomever Minister Farrakhan chooses to meet? The meeting, held in New York at the Adam Clayton Powell State Office Building in Harlem, was designed for community and political leaders to meet with The Minister to discuss the celebration and commemoration of the largest, most successful, and most peaceful mass rally ever held in the nation’s capital.

What business is it of the Jewish community’s that Black leaders decide to meet to determine their future? Are you implying that Blacks need your permission to discuss amongst ourselves how to rectify the ills that members of the Jewish community have heaped upon us? For purposes of historical accuracy let me remind you that the plight of Black people is intrinsically tied to the suffering we have endured throughout our 350 years of chattel slavery and over 100 years of neo-slavery under Jim Crow laws, an institution of dehumanization that was instituted and controlled largely at the hands of Jews. Have you had the opportunity to read Jews Selling Blacks, or The Secret Relationship between Blacks and Jews, Vols. 1 and 2?

One of the consistent themes of The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan is the issue of economic independence. Throughout our history in America many of our leaders who have advocated economic independence have been labeled “anti-Semitic.” They include Booker T. Washington, W.E.B. DuBois, Marcus Garvey, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., The Honorable Elijah Muhammad, Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, and the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan. Is “anti-Semitism” a ruse used by Jews to obfuscate the real issue of Jewish racism and economic domination?

By focusing attention on so-called Black racism, the real racists are able to redirect negative attention away from themselves and continue their dominance unimpeded. Jewish leaders in the Civil Rights Movement, for example, fostered a philosophy they called “Non-Economic Liberalism” that they promoted to Black people, while practicing economic independence for themselves. The fear of the Jewish leaders is that Minister Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam are poised to break that cycle of Black economic dependence forever.

Never in the history of our sojourn in America have Blacks ever been asked to give our permission to have Jews meet among themselves to discuss their issues. When the leaders of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), or Simon Wiesenthal Center, or the Jewish Defense League, or the 51 organizations that are a part of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations meet, Blacks are not involved in or invited to the deliberations; nor do we criticize those assembled for dealing with issues germane to the Jews. Why the double standard?

Are you upset because you exercise no control over The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam? Your representatives cannot hand pick NOI leaders, or tell us what and how to think. We are independent of your money, your influence, and your control of the media.

You accuse The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan of being a hater of Jewish people and an anti-Semite, but you fail to show where one strand of Jewish hair on the head of one Jewish person has been disturbed. Moreover, the former Mayor of Philadelphia and former Governor of Pennsylvania, Ed Rendell, a member of the Jewish community, personally invited Min. Farrakhan to come to the “City of Brotherly Love” to quell a growing dispute between the Black and White communities. The mayor and Minister Farrakhan clasped hands, formed a circle and the audience joined in and sang an old Negro Spiritual. The Jewish mayor of Philadelphia ended by saying, “I want to thank you for what you stand for and for all the good it does to so many people in Philadelphia.”

And there is no mention by you of the unity meeting Min. Farrakhan had with a delegation of rabbis representing the Neturei Karta Jewish community. After their historic meeting Rabbi David Weiss commented, “The Jews misconstrued his statements. They (Zionists) changed Judaism with their new style. This is Zionism. Judaism is not like this.” Are you, sir, among those who are misconstruing The Minister’s statements?

Further, the man you refer to as a “hater” was invited by the top military training institution in the world, the United States Military Academy at West Point to teach Black and White cadets wisdom, knowledge and understanding. His lecture resulted in a rousing standing ovation.

However, history proves that Jews have no record of working toward interracial harmony. The Dean of Black History, John Henrik Clark, wrote that 100 million Black people lost their lives in the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Richard Hull, author of Jews and Judaism in Africa History, outlines the significant role Jews played in all aspects of the African slave trade. Kidnapping, slave-dealing, and enslavement led to the destruction and destabilization of Africa. It is a history that continues today. The recent rioting that took place in Jerusalem is the result of Israel’s long history of racist and discriminatory practices against the Ethiopian Jews.

You mentioned the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) and the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) as two of the Jewish organizations that have labeled The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan as an “anti-Semite.” The ADL has long ago been identified as an enemy of Black people. It has spied on Civil Rights groups, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, as well as the Nation of Islam. The ADL spied for the FBI. The SPLC has been discredited and discarded by both religious organizations and federal government agencies because of its inaccurate and biased data on “hate groups.”

Tavis Smiley reports in his recent publication, Death of a King, that the Jewish community became increasingly disenchanted with Dr. King after his criticism of the State of Israel following the conclusion of the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. The ADL labeled Dr. King “a loose cannon.” Just before he was assassinated Dr. King had joined most leaders of the Black community, who equated Zionism with racism.

The ADL, through its own internal research, concluded that the Nation of Islam was not anti-Semitic. However, racist and Islamaphobic members of the ADL and the SPLC have sought to discredit the Nation of Islam and Minister Farrakhan for over 50 years so that it could use the NOI and Min. Farrakhan as a deceptive ploy to raise funds for their organizations.

We do not interfere with your organizations. We have not interfered with your businesses or your business interests. We respectfully request that you reciprocate. Our desire to be free of your interference and control of our affairs now outweighs your desire to keep us in neo-slavery. The commemoration and celebration of the Million Man March on October 10, 2015, in Washington, DC, is a further step in that direction.

(Jackie Muhammad is a member of the Nation of Islam Research Group. Visit them online at https://noirg.org and join the conversation on FaceBook.com/NOIResearch and Twitter @ NOIResearch. He can be reached at [email protected].)

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