WASHINGTON, 27 February 2005 — Daniel Pipes, the man who has angered many for his ongoing criticism of Muslim-Americans, and the creator of “Campus Watch” a group dedicated to monitoring and exposing alleged anti-Semitic, anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian, and/or Islamist bias in teachers of Middle Eastern studies at US colleges and universities (campuswatch.com), is allegedly proposing the creation of an institution that will overlook the “long term…legal activities of Islamists which pose as much or even a greater set of challenges than the illegal ones,” according to the draft obtained by journalists of a grant proposal by Pipes’ Middle East Forum.

Daniel Pipes is against Muslims — period,” said Nihad Awad, executive director of CAIR, the Council on American Islamic Relations, who said they are trying to obtain the full copy of this draft.

“His mission in life is really to block to American Muslim advancement in America because his Islamophobic tendencies are pushing him to fight everything about Muslims in America.”

Pipes also works with Stephen Schwartz at the Center for Islamic Pluralism (CIP) http://www.islamicpluralism.org/, whose aims are to “promote moderate Islam in the US and globally” and “to oppose the influence of militant Islam, and, in particular, the Saudi-funded Wahhabi sect of Islam, among American Muslims, in the America media, in American education…and with US governmental bodies…”

The CIP proposal, boasts “strong links” with Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and other notable neo-conservatives, such as former Central Intelligence director James Woolsey and the vice president for foreign policy programming at the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute, Danielle Pletka.

Pipes’ nomination by Bush in 2003 to serve as a director on the board of the quasi-governmental US Institute of Peace, a government-funded think tank set up in 1984 to “promote the prevention, management, and peaceful resolution of international conflicts,” moved the controversy over his work from academia into the US Senate where such appointments are virtually always approved without controversy.

Pipes’ nomination, however, created an uproar when major Muslim, Arab-American, and academic groups, and several Democratic senators, opposing the nomination as inappropriate.

Several Republican senators subsequently warned Bush that they would oppose the nomination if it came to a vote, and, in the end, the president made a ”recess appointment” that gave him a limited term lasting only until the end of 2004. Despite the November elections and the Republican majority in the Senate, it appears that Bush will not nominate him for a second term.

“It is very disturbing that a small minority like this is trying to set the tone of the Administration on how to deal with Islam and Muslims. We’re comforted by the fact that the Administration is rejecting Pipes and his companions by not renominating him at the USIP. They know him for him extremist views, and we’re hoping the people who work with him understand they should not be seen as bigoted Muslim haters like him,” said Awad.

“He has even said that American Muslins are a threat to American Jews, which is ridiculous,” said Awad, quoting Pipes statement to the American Jewish Congress Convention, 10/21/01: “[The] increased stature, and affluence, and enfranchisement of American Muslims…will present true dangers to American Jews.”

“Daniel Pipes gives a bad name to Jews — and mainstream Jewish organizations should disavow his tactics,” Awad said.

“It is for the benefit and the interest of our nation that the Administration fully utilizes the American Muslim organizations to improve relations with the Muslim world and not listen to these extremists.”