Basim Elkarra

Overview

Basim Elkarra has expressed support for a terrorist, promoted incitement and demonized Israel.

As of August 2019, Elkarra was listed on the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) California website as the Executive Director for CAIR’s chapter in Sacramento Valley, California.

As of the same date, Elkarra’s Linkedin page said he was a Trustee at Twin Rivers Unified School District since July 2016, the “Chair, Sacramento Community Police Review Commission,” since June 2017 and the Community Police Commissioner from October 2015 to June 2017.

Elkarra’s LinkedIn also saidhe received his bachelor’s degree in Political Science from University of California, Berkeley (UC, Berkeley) in 2003, where he was the president of Muslim Students Association (MSA) in 2001 and was reportedly a member of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP). He also attended the City College of San Francisco (CCSF) from 1998-2000. 

Supporting a Terrorist

On October 24, 2013, Elkarra tweeted: “Drop the Charges against Rasmea Yousef Odeh petitions.moveon.org/s/ZZXH3H @moveon.” 

Odeh was a military operative with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), an internationally designated terrorist organization. In 1969, she masterminded a bombing that killed two university students in a Jerusalem supermarket. Odeh also attempted to bomb the British consulate.
 
Odeh confessed, in a highly detailed account, the day following her arrest. In a 2004 documentary, one of Odeh’s co-conspirators directly implicated her as the mastermind. 

In 1970, an Israeli court tried and convicted Odeh for her involvement in both bombings and sentenced her to life imprisonment. However, Odeh was released 10 years later, in a prisoner swap and emigrated to the United States. In 2017, Odeh was deported to Jordan and stripped of U.S. citizenship, after admitting to immigration fraud.

Promoting Incitement

Elkarra retweeted a June 2, 2019 tweet that said: “Extremist Jews parading thru Arab Quarter & entering The Haram during end on Ramadan ‘celebrating Israel’s occupation of Jerusalem’ is pure provocation. That’s what it was designed to be!...” 

“The Haram” in the June 2, 2019 tweet referred to the Al-Aqsa Mosque. Haram is an Arabic term meaning “sanctuary” or “holy shrine.” The Al-Aqsa Mosque is located on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount.

The June 2, 2019 tweet included an article about clashes between Palestinians and Jews who ascended the Temple Mount.  

Israeli Police reportedly used riot dispersal measures after hundreds of Palestinians protested Jews entering the holy site by hurling stones and chairs at Israeli security forces. 

The allegation that Jews “threaten” to destroy the Al-Aqsa Mosque has been a traditional pretext for Arab attacks on Jews long before the existence of the modern Jewish state. Such propaganda served as the excuse for an upsurge in Palestinian violence that flared in the fall of 2015 and incited Palestinians to attempt mass casualty attacks on Israeli civilians in July 2016.. 

Demonizing Israel

Elkarra retweeted a November 30, 2018 tweet featuring an article about Marc Lamont Hill. The November 30, 2018 tweet said: “RT @bmaygers: @YousefMunayyer on CNN: ‘The demand that Palestinians have equal rights from the river to the sea is not radical or racist or bigoted. Rather, anything short of that would be’."

In November 2018, Marc Lamont Hill was fired from his position as a contributor to CNN News network following controversial comments he made during a meeting held at the United Nations for an “International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People.”

During the meeting, Hill reportedly whitewashed Palestinian violence and accused Israel of “state violence and ethnic cleansing.” He also called for a “free Palestine from the river to the sea.”  

“From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free” is a chant calling to dismantle the State of Israel. It has also been employed by Hamas leader Khaled Mashal to call for the replacement of Israel with an Islamic state.

On July 23, 2014, during Operation Protective Edge (OPE), Elkarra tweeted: “Tell @WhiteHouse & @JohnKerry: End Gaza War and Lift Blockade petitions.moveon.org/s/4=mhFe @moveon.”

The United Nations approved [pp. 39–41] the Israeli-Egyptian blockade of Gaza in 2011 as a security measure to stop Hamas from acquiring sophisticated rockets. Multiple flotillas have attempted to breach the blockade, with at least one flotilla initiating a violent confrontation with Israeli forces. 

On July 18, 2014, Elkarra posted on Facebook: “#ActionAlert: Want to help #Palestine? Here's How…”.  Elkarra’s post linked to a CAIR “action alert” that described OPE as “a relentless and illegal Israeli military campaign.”

Israel commenced OPE in July 2014 to stop rocket fire targeting Israeli civilians and to destroy Hamas attack tunnels.

On April 9, 2002, during an interview with CNN, Elkarra promoted the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement and compared Israel to Apartheid South Africa, stating: “we are trying to bring awareness and with this divestment, just like the apartheid in South Africa, there is a divestment campaign which worked, and which really helped to bring an end to apartheid, so we are trying to do the same when it comes to Israel.”

CAIR

CAIR describes itself as a “grassroots civil rights and advocacy group” and “America's largest Muslim civil liberties organization, with regional offices nationwide.” Its official mission is “enhance understanding of Islam, protect civil rights, promote justice, and empower American Muslims.”

CAIR reportedly has “significant ties” to the Muslim Brotherhood, as well as Hamas. A number of former CAIR employees have been convicted on fraud and terrorism-related charges that resulted monetary fines, jail terms and, sometimes, deportation.

CAIR was founded in 1994 and opened its first office in Washington, DC, with the help of a $5,000 donation from the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF), a charity founded by Mousa Abu Marzook.

Marzook, who was listed as a "Specially Designated Terrorist" by the U.S. Treasury Department in 1995, is reportedly a senior member of Hamas.

In May 2007, CAIR was listed as an “unindicted co-conspirator” in a U.S.-filed action against the HLF for providing funds to Hamas.

CAIR was also listed  as a terrorist entity by the United Arab Emirates, in 2014.  

MSA

The MSA was  established by members of the Muslim Brotherhood in January 1963 at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, with the goal of "spreading Islam as students in North America." A 2004 FBI investigation uncovered an internal Muslim Brotherhood document in which a brotherhood leader identified the MSA as "one of our organizations." 

The MSA reportedly has “nearly 600 chapters” located in the United States and Canada, and is “the most visible and influential Islamic student organization in North America,” boasting conferences, special events, publications, websites and other activities.

The organization includes a number of previous chapter presidents with explicit links to terrorist groups. Included are al-Qaeda cleric Anwar al-Awlaki (Colorado State University), Somali al-Shabaab militant leader Omar Shafik Hammami (University of South Alabama) and Pakistani Taliban recruiter Ramy Zamzam of the MSA's Washington, D.C. council.  

BDS

The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement was founded by Omar Barghouti in 2005 to challenge “international support for Israeli apartheid and settler-colonialism.” BDS is an allegedly “Palestinian-led movement,” although leading BDS activists have admitted [00:01:01] this is not true. 

One of the demands of BDS includes [point 3] what is generally known as the “right of return,” a demand discredited as a way to eliminate Israel. Barghouti said the “right of return” is a means to “end Israel’s existence as a Jewish state.”  

Barghouti has said that BDS “aims to turn Israel into a pariah state, as South Africa once was.”

In his activism, Barghouti has also said [00:05:55] regarding Israel: “Definitely, most definitely, we oppose a Jewish state in any part of Palestine. No…rational Palestinian, not a sellout Palestinian, will ever accept a Jewish state in Palestine.”

The movement has been linked to numerous terrorist organizations and received a public endorsement from Hamas in 2017.

BDS initiatives include calling on institutions and individuals to divest from Israeli-affiliated companies, promoting academic and cultural boycotts of Israel, and organizing anti-Israel rallies, protests and campaigns.

The movement’s most notable achievement has been the infiltration of university campuses through lobbying for “BDS resolutions.” In these cases, student governments and student groups, backed by their own anti-Israel members and affiliates, have proposed resolutions on some form of boycott of, or divestment from, Israel and Israeli-affiliated entities.

Boycott resolutions, although non-binding, have been passed by student governments on numerous North American campuses.

BDS activity is often aggressive and disruptive. It has been noted that universities that pass BDS resolutions see a marked increase in anti-Semitic incidents on campus. On one campus, when the student government debated a BDS resolution, reports emerged of violent threats against those opposing it.

Social Media and Weblinks

Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/636290542
 
Twitter:https://twitter.com/basimelkarra 

LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/basimelkarra/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/basimelkarra