CAIR school guide blames 9/11 on US support for Israel, recommends Bin Laden manifesto

Among its recommended resources was bin Laden’s “Letter to America,” which contains antisemitic claims about Jewish control over US politics, media and the economy.

By Vered Weiss, World Israel News

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) removed a link from its annual back-to-school guide after the linked curriculum blamed US support for Israel for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and recommended Osama bin Laden’s “Letter to America” as a student resource.

CAIR released its “Back to School Resource Guide” for K-12 students Monday, but the link was removed a day later.

The 16-page guide directed readers to a “Muslim Studies Curriculum,” a collaborative project between CAIR-NJ and Teaching While Muslim.

The curriculum described the nearly 3,000 deaths on 9/11 as the work of a “group self-identifying as Al Qaeda hailing from the mountains of Afghanistan.”

It attributed the attack in part to US “support of Israel,” American involvement in the Persian Gulf War and the “vast presence” of US forces across the Middle East.

Among its recommended resources was bin Laden’s “Letter to America,” which contains antisemitic claims about Jewish control over US politics, media and the economy.

The curriculum also presented bin Laden as among the Afghan “rebels” fighting the Soviet Union during the 1980s.

The material focused heavily on the consequences of 9/11 for Muslims, including increased hate crimes and discrimination.

CAIR said lessons about the attacks can be “a particularly dangerous time for Muslim students,” who “often experience a surge in bullying during school lessons about 9/11.”

The curriculum also described the post-9/11 period as producing an “aggressive shift in US domestic and foreign policy” and an “erosion of civil liberties of many Americans.”

Nicholas Haros Jr., whose mother, Frances, was killed on 9/11, criticized the curriculum.

“Israel had nothing to do with 9/11,” Haros said. “The further we get from 9/11, this new generation of kids will learn to blame our country. These kids are going to be poisoned – and that’s the intent.”

When contacted by the New York Post, CAIR did not deny removing the link and referred the newspaper to a note explaining changes to an earlier document.