It is essential that Maryland’s hate crime commission be hate-free
The proposition that people and groups who engage in hate speech should not serve on an anti-hate commission is obvious, yet judging from recent testimony in Annapolis, even this basic concept is up for debate.
On Feb. 20, the House Judiciary Committee held a public hearing on House Bill 763, which removes the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) from Maryland’s Commission on Hate Crime Response and Prevention, and replaces the CAIR member with two representatives of the Muslim community.
The legislation was prompted by CAIR’s comments regarding the massacre perpetrated by Hamas in Israel on Oct. 7. Zainab Chaudry, the director of CAIR’s Maryland office and the CAIR representative on the commission, characterized the events of Oct. 7 as an “uprising” of “freedom fighters” against a Jewish State that she compared to Nazi Germany. And CAIR’s national executive director, Nihad Awad, declared that he “was happy to see” Palestinians break out of Gaza on Oct. 7, and proclaimed that “as an occupying power,” Israel has no right of self-defense.
CAIR and its members have every right to applaud terrorists who viciously murdered 1,200 Israelis and abducted over 200 men, women and children, many of whom are still in captivity. However, by doing so, they disqualified themselves from serving on a Maryland commission whose very purpose is to “communicate and promote understanding of diverse perspectives in a positive and meaningful way.”
Ignoring and seemingly indifferent to the noxiousness of CAIR’s support of the worst attack on Jews since the Holocaust, opponents of H.B. 763 — which included local representatives of the ACLU, the NAACP, and Jewish Voices for Peace — testified before the House Judiciary Committee that the bill was a vicious smear campaign designed to quash Palestinian voices and to undermine democratic values. None of this criticism of H.B. 763 is justified.
First, far from being a “smear campaign,” the comments of Ms. Chaudry and Mr. Awad that form the basis for H.B. 763 are a matter of record. The White House issued a statement condemning Mr. Awad’s “shocking, anti-Semitic statements in the strongest terms.” Ms. Chaudry has never denied her comments, and at last month’s hearing, she was specifically asked whether she retracted her comments but declined to do so.
Second, the aim of H.B. 763 is not to “quash” Palestinian voices; it is to remove hateful and inflammatory voices. CAIR should be removed from the commission not because of its position regarding Israel, Palestinians, settlements or the current war in Gaza, but rather because of its approval of the murder of Jews.
Finally, what will undermine democracy is not the passage of H.B. 763, but the gross and outrageous lack of civility displayed by the comments of CAIR leaders justifying the murder of innocent civilians by a terrorist organization whose charter calls for the destruction of Israel. In an era in which debased and vulgar discourse is the norm, it should not be tolerated from members of any public body, much less from members of a hate crimes commission.
Maryland’s Commission on Hate Crime Response and Prevention has important work to do. Over the past year, and particularly since Oct. 7, reported hate incidents against both Jews and Muslims have spiked, both in Maryland and across the country. However, the commission lacks the credibility and the moral authority to address this issue if it is comprised of organizations and individuals who are themselves part of the problem.
No less than arsonists running a fire department, it is absurd and self-defeating for dispensers of hate to serve on a commission to combat hate. By removing CAIR, H.B. 763 is an essential step toward restoring the credibility and moral authority of a Commission on Hate Crime Response and Prevention which today sorely lacks it.