Column: The Rabble-rousers

My latest column at al-Masri al-Youm is up, on funding of the anti-Park51 movement by extremist elements of the US pro-Israel lobby.

The connection between the core of the Park51 movement — the people who have provided leadership, organization and funding to the campaign — is simply too big to ignore. So is the increasing overlap of a segment of the "professional" pro-Israel lobby in America, from think tanks to magazines, and the incitement of Islamophobia. This is bad news for Americans of all persuasions, bad news for Jews, bad news for Muslims, and bad news for the Middle East. It needs to be stopped before it gets too far, and the first step is to call out the likes of David Horowitz, Daniel Pipes and Pamela Geller (and their far-flung associates) for what they are.