The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today called on MSNBC to condemn and ban Anti-Defamation League (ADL) CEO Jonathan Greenblatt for the latest defamatory remarks he made on air, falsely slandering Jewish and Palestinian college student groups as “Iranian proxies” equivalent to Hezbollah.
During an appearance on MSNBC, Greenblatt said, “Iran has their military proxies like Hezbollah, and Iran has their campus proxies like these groups like SJP and JVP.” [NOTE: SJP is Students for Justice in Palestine. JVP is Jewish Voice for Peace.]
This is at least the third time that Greenblatt has made inflammatory remarks without being challenged on MSNBC.
More than 60 Muslim, Arab, Palestinian, and allied organizations recently called or Greenblatt to be fired after he analogized the Palestinian keffiyeh scarf with the Nazi swastika.
In October, Greenblatt also criticized MSNBC’s coverage of the Middle East crisis and questioned whether MSNBC’s scripts were written by Hamas sympathizers.
In a statement, CAIR Deputy Executive Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell said:
“Falsely claiming that Jewish and Palestinian student organizations are literal proxies of the Iranian government is a dangerous and defamatory slander that has no place on MSNBC or any other television network.
“No civil rights leader would ever equate Jewish and Palestinian college students with Hezbollah, analogize the Nazi swastika to the Palestinian keffiyeh or question whether Hamas sympathizers were writing MSNBC scripts.
“Mr. Greenblatt’s increasingly unhinged and outrageous comments must be condemned, and MSNBC should no longer give him a platform to peddle his hate speech.”
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CONTACT: CAIR National Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell, 404-285-9530, e-Mitchell@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper, 202-744-7726, ihooper@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Manager Ismail Allison, 202-770-6280, iallison@cair.com