Muqtedar Khan and the Saban Center

Khan sahib is well known to readers of this blog, he first joined the Progressive Muslim Union North America's advisory board, only to be later driven out by Tarek Fatah and his crew. Khan's subsequent resignation letter is however to be credited. We are familiar with Khan's weird politics , dreams of becoming the first "Muslim" Henry Kissinger - and his attacks on Shi'a Muslim scholars.

Mutqedar Khan has been part of the liberal imperialsts crew for some time at the Brooking Institute.

That affiliation is bad enough - but amongst his credentials he now also lists Senior Nonresident Fellow with the Saban Center at Brookings Institution. So what is this "Saban Center?"

The name might give us a clue or two, it is named after Haim Saban :

born in Alexandria, Egypt and moved to Israel as a child. He is a financial donor and founder of the Saban Institute for the Study of the American Political System at the University of Tel Aviv.

Saban is a member of the Board of Trustees at the Brookings Institution. In a NYT interview (Andrew Ross Sorkin, "Schlepping to Moguldom", September 5, 2004) he stated: "In 2002, he pledged $13 million to start a research organization at the Brookings Institution called the Saban Center for Middle East Policy."

The same interview lists this quote: "I'm a one-issue guy and my issue is Israel".

Khan's affiliation should not come as any surprise to many of us. What is unfortunate is that he been given credibility by some Muslims, such as Shahed Amanullah, who publishes him on his website altmuslim.

Here are a couple more quotes from the founder of the institute where Muqtedar Khan is a "senior fellow"

"On the issues of security and terrorism I am a total hawk," he said."I'm a Democrat for the reinforcement of the Patriot Act. It's not strong enough. The A.C.L.U. can eat their heart out, but they are living in the 1970's. We should all have ID's. You betcha. What do you have to hide? Some friends of mine on the left side think I'm crazy."

Why is he so supportive of Israel? "I hate quoting Tom DeLay, I really do,"Mr. Saban said. "If you're going to quote me quoting Tom DeLay, say I hate quoting him." He continued, apparently quoting Mr. DeLay, the House Republican leader: "He said: 'It is the right thing for us to do to be supportive of Israel. The reasons go back to the beginning of time.' "

Muqtedar used to also have a regular column on Muslim Wake Up -- but since his falling out with PMUNA, he has found himself a new home at Amanullah's altmuslim.