Hamas sympathiser invited to Obama gathering

Politico:

One of the religious leaders invited to address Barack Obama’s inaugural prayer service Wednesday heads an Islamic group named by federal prosecutors as a co-conspirator in a terrorism-fundraising trial in Texas.

Ingrid Mattson, president of the Islamic Society of North America, is scheduled to join Christian ministers and Jewish rabbis offering prayers for the new president and his family during a service at the National Cathedral in Washington, organizers announced Friday.

Mattson’s group calls itself “the largest Muslim umbrella organization” in North America. However, in May 2007, federal prosecutors included ISNA on a list of nearly 300 co-conspirators filed in a criminal case charging that the Holy Land Foundation of Richardson, Texas, funneled more than $12 million to Hamas.

The U.S. government designated Hamas as a terrorist group in 1995.

...

The court has not ruled on the groups’ motion, but in a brief filed last July, federal prosecutor James Jacks said there was ample evidence of the Islamic groups’ ties to the Holy Land Foundation.

“During last year's trial, numerous exhibits were entered into evidence establishing both ISNA's and NAIT's intimate relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood, the Palestine Committee, and the defendants in this case," Mr. Jacks wrote . "They were intimately connected with the HLF and its assigned task of providing financial support to HAMAS. ... That ISNA and NAIT appeared in these documents and share a common history with these defendants is a reflection of the evidence, not any attempt to 'disparage' or 'vilify.'"

...

The story quotes the organizer, but apparently was unable to reach Mattson. It would be easy enough for her to renounce support for the Hamas death cult, but so far I have seen noting to indicate that she or her group has done so.