Do You Want to Be a Teacher at a Private School Led by an ‘ISIS Imam’?
Muslim Federation advertises job positions for terror-linked Miami madrassa.
By Joe Kaufman
Joe Kaufman is a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and the Chairman of the Joe Kaufman Security Initiative. He was the 2014, 2016 and 2018 Republican Nominee for U.S. House of Representatives (Florida-CD23).
The South Florida Muslim Federation (SoFlo Muslims) is an umbrella group for South Florida’s many Islamic extremist entities, including radical mosques. However, one fanatic mosque that the Federation is yet to affiliate with is Masjid As-Sunnah An-Nabawiyyah, the North Miami Islamic Center (NMIC). That may be changing, though, as the Federation recently used its social media to announce vacancies and advertise teaching jobs for the children’s school run by the mosque, Reviver Academy. Given the level of bigotry and incitement that is preached at NMIC, it is obvious as to why the Federation is eager to aid and abet its establishment.
On July 12th, an ad appeared on the Muslim Federation Facebook page with a large Reviver Academy logo affixed to it, stating the following: “Vacancy… Reviver Academy K-12 Grade Teachers Needed – SoFlo Muslims.” When clicking on the ad, you are brought to a page on the Federation website with more details about the Reviver job description, discussing position requirements, qualifications, benefits and compensation. You are even able to fill out and submit a resume directly via the Federation site. Question: What is so special about this school that the Federation is working so hard to help recruit teachers for it?
Reviver Academy was founded, in 2012, as an affordable alternative and to keep more in line with Islamic fundamentalist doctrine than existing Muslim elementary schools. Upon visiting the Reviver Facebook, one can see a number of disturbing posts, including the announcement of an NMIC memorial for deceased Muslim Brotherhood icon and recently ousted Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi. Another (colored in red) reads, “Plant the seed of faith in your CHILDREN and reap the rewards even in the GRAVE.” While the message may be clear, why would the school want to subject young impressionable kids to such morbid images of death and the afterlife?
The Sharia Director, board member and spokesman for Reviver Academy is NMIC imam Fadi Kablawi. According to Kablawi, the FBI believes he is also a member of ISIS. In December 2013, Kablawi spent time in the Rikers Island Jail Complex, after the TSA had accused him of having explosive residue on his clothing and claiming that he was in possession of a bomb. As well, Kablawi hates Jews with a passion. This past December, he described Jews as “the lowest of the lowest.” In September, he proclaimed, “You will find the most enemies to the believers are the Jews.” And in July 2020, he said that Jews were behind all “the corruption in the Earth.”
Quran scholar Ibrahim Akar sits atop all Reviver teachers, on the school’s website. In March 2015, Akar made the vile claim that “90% of women… are cursed by God.” He further said that women “wearing perfume outside the house is forbidden” and is an act of adultery. He cynically concluded by asking, “Did you know why most of the people of the Hellfire are women?” This past December, Imam Kablawi added his own thoughts about women. He told his congregation that, if a Muslim man marries a Christian woman, he must forbid her from attending church and “a wife – Christian or Muslim – she is not allowed to leave your house without your permission.”
It is no wonder as to why the Muslim Federation would elect to actively assist a mosque like NMIC in their quest to hire new teachers, as the Federation already is tied to a number of other radical mosques. One mosque the Federation harbors, Masjid Jamaat Al-Mumineen (MJAM), promotes on its website material referring to Jews and Christians as “the enemies of Islam” and advocating female genital mutilation, death punishments for homosexuals, and the stoning of women. MJAM’s imam, Izhar Khan, who sits on the Federation’s Council of Imams, was alleged by the FBI to have helped finance the Taliban for the purpose of murdering US troops overseas.
Another Federation mosque is the Islamic Center of Boca Raton (ICBR). ICBR co-founder and current Federation participant, Bassem Alhalabi, was a former assistant to Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) leader Sami al-Arian. In June 2003, Alhalabi was charged by the US Commerce Department with illegally shipping a $13,000 thermal imaging device to Syria. ICBR co-founder, Syed Ahmad, was a website designer for Hamas. In October 1999, ICBR published a violently anti-Semitic essay on its website, ‘Why can’t the Jews and Muslims live together in peace?’ It called Jews “enemies” and spoke of a day when Muslims will “fight the Jews and kill them.”
MJAM and ICBR are but two of several examples of the extremist entities which flourish under the aegis of the South Florida Muslim Federation. It is obvious as to why this umbrella organization is advertising teaching positions and soliciting staff for the Reviver Academy and NMIC mosque. And while all three of these mosques insidiously refer to Jews as the enemy, in fact, it is the opposite. It is these violence-prone, intolerant Islamic centers and the Muslim Federation that houses and shills for them that pose the real threat. For these reasons and more, they all need to be shut down.
Beila Rabinowitz, Director of Militant Islam Monitor, contributed to this report.