That libel, the lawsuit charges, included claims that the "ISB receives funds from Wahhabis and/or Muslim Brotherhood and/or other Saudi/Middle Eastern sources" and that "the ISB Project was supported financially by donors from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states 'with known connections to radical Islamists.' " Given the Saudi role in disseminating jihadist fanaticism, it might indeed have been defamatory to falsely accuse the ISB of financial ties to Saudi Arabia.
But those ties are all too real.
According to financial documents supplied to The Boston Globe, major funding for the mosque is being provided by the Islamic Development Bank in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. In December 2005, for example, two payments of approximately $250,000 each were wired from Jeddah to the Citizens Bank account of the mosque's general contractor in Boston. Messages confirming the payments were faxed from Jeddah to the Islamic Society of Boston on Dec. 19. Other documents suggest that subsequent payments have been made as well. Yesterday, the ISB for the first time acknowledged receiving $1 million in financing from the Saudi bank.
The Islamic Development Bank is a subsidiary of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, and each of the conference's 56 member nations are shareholders. But the largest shares are owned by Saudi Arabia, Libya, and Iran, which together control 48 percent of the bank's stock. Saudi Arabia, Libya, and Iran are also three of the world's foremost sponsors or incubators of terrorism. It is perhaps not surprising that the Islamic Development Bank, through its Al-Quds and Al-Aqsa funds, has become a leading funder of Palestinian suicide bombing, paying large financial subsidies to the families of terrorists.
The Islamic Society of Boston didn't return my calls, but its website notes that all donors are cross-checked against the government's terrorist watch list, and that funding is accepted only "with no strings attached." It notes too that it "rejects any interpretation of Islam that is considered fundamentalist, oppressive, radical, anti-Western, or anti-Semitic."
But questions remain. More questions will come. Suing the good people who ask them won't make the questions go away. Answering them candidly, on the other hand, just might.
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