Middle East Forum

History

The Middle East Forum was founded in 1990 by Daniel Pipes as an independent non-profit organization with the mission of "promoting American interests." In 2002, the MEF advocated for strong U.S. ties with Turkey, Israel, and other pro-American governments in the region, a stable price for oil, human rights, and peaceful conflict resolutions. It publishes the Middle East Quarterly and runs various advocacy programs. Pipes said in 2003 that "militant Islam is the problem and moderate Islam is the answer." The left-leaning Center for American Progress and the Southern Poverty Law Center have criticized the MEF for spreading anti-Islamic messages.

Activities

Support for Tommy Robinson

In 2018, the MEF stated that it had been "heavily involved" in the release from prison of British anti-Islam activist and far-right political operative*

• Tommy Robinson, who is best known as a co-founder, former spokesman and former leader of the English Defence League (EDL) organization, and for his service as a political adviser to the leader of the UK Independence Party (UKIP), Gerard Batten. They revealed that "the full resources of the Middle East Forum were activated to free Mr. Robinson", which included: conferring with Robinson's legal team and providing necessary funds; funding, organizing and staffing the "Free Tommy" London rallies on 9 June and 14 July, which was, they claim, reported by The Times, The Guardian, and The Independent; funding travel of the US congressman, Rep. Paul Gosar, Republican from Arizona, to London to address the rallies; and lobbied Sam Brownback, the State Department's ambassador-at-large for International Religious Freedom, to raise the issue with the UK's ambassador, which he did. The MEF has itself been considered a part of the counter-jihad movement.

Georgetown University's Bridge Initiative reported in 2018 that the MEF had received millions of dollars from Donors Capital Fund ($6,768,000), the William Rosenwald Family Fund, the Middle Road Foundation, and the Abstraction Fund.

''Middle East Quarterly''

| impact-year = | link1-name = Online access | link2-name = Online archive

Middle East Quarterly was founded in 1994 by Daniel Pipes and the current editor-in-chief is journalist and Middle East analyst Jonathan Spyer.

Reception

In 2002 Juan Cole, a professor at the University of Michigan and a Campus Watch target, accused the journal of making "scurrilous attacks on people". In 2014, Christopher A. Bail of Duke University described it as a "pseudo-academic" journal with editorial board members who share an ideological outlook, adding that while it appears to present legitimate academic research, it is regularly criticized "as a channel for anti-Muslim polemics".

Abstracting and indexing

The journal is abstracted and indexed in:

• EBSCO databases
• Index Islamicus
• International Bibliography of the Social Sciences
• Modern Language Association Database
• ProQuest databases
• Scopus

Campus Watch

In 2002, the Middle East Forum launched an initiative called Campus Watch that it said would identify "analytical failures, the mixing of politics with scholarship, intolerance of alternative views, apologetics, and the abuse of power over students" within academia. Winfield Myers is the director of Campus Watch.

Initially, Campus Watch published the profile of eight university professors and teachers, who, it said, were "hostile" to America and "preaching dangerous rhetoric to students". This led around 100 professors to accuse Campus Watch of "McCarthyesque" intimidation and ask that their names be listed on Campus Watch too. Subsequently, Campus Watch removed the list from its website.

Israel Victory Project

The Israel Victory Project, launched in 2017, is an initiative aimed at securing an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by putting pressure on Palestinians to end anti-Israel terrorism and acknowledge Israel's legitimacy as a Jewish state, rather than through bilateral negotiations. Daniel Pipes has stated that "Peace is not made with enemies; peace is made with former enemies."

References

References

1. (9 May 2013). "Middle East Forum - Nonprofit Explorer".
2. MacFarquhar, Neil. (14 March 2007). "Scrutiny Increases for a Group Advocating for Muslims in U.S.". [[The New York Times]].
3. (9 May 2013). "Middle East Forum". [[ProPublica]].
4. [http://www.fpa.org/topics_info2414/topics_info_show.htm?doc_id=125024 "Middle East Forum"] listed in "Search Results" and "Resource Library" on the website of the [[Foreign Policy Association]]; cf. organization website for [http://www.meforum.org Meforum.org], Middle East Forum, one of [http://www.danielpipes.org/sites.php DanielPipes.org"], "Daniel Pipes's websites" (incl. its "Mission" statement), all accessed 24 February 2007.
5. (10 April 2002). "American Forum Policy, Islam topic of talk tonight". North Adams Transcript.
6. "The Islamophobia misinformation experts". [[Center for American Progress]].
7. Caruso, David. (13 April 2003). "Peace think tank selection stuns Muslim groups". The Atlanta Constitution.
8. Pitts, Jonathan. (18 January 2018). "Foreign affairs council won't disinvite critic of 'militant Islam'". The Baltimore Sun.
9. Gregg Roman. (1 August 2018). "Tommy Robinson Free – MEF Heavily Involved".
10. "The EDL – Britain's Far Right Social Movement". Radicalism and New Media Research Group, [[University of Northampton]], 22 September 2011.
11. Bailey, Luke. (14 July 2018). "This hardline US conservative think tank says it's funding Tommy Robinson rallies in the UK". iNews.
12. Perwee, Ed. (2020). "Donald Trump, the anti-Muslim far right and the new conservative revolution". Ethnic and Racial Studies.
13. (14 August 2018). "Middle East Forum {{!}} Factsheet: Islamophobia {{!}} The Bridge Initiative". [[Georgetown University]].
14. (30 September 2002). "Mau-mauing the Middle East".
15. (2014). "Terrified : how anti-Muslim fringe organizations became mainstream". [[Princeton University Press]].
16. "Middle East Quarterly".
17. "Source details: Middle East Quarterly". [[Elsevier]].
18. Qtd. from "Mission Statement," in [http://www.campus-watch.org/about.php "About Campus Watch"], ''Campus Watch'' (''campus-watch.org''), n.d., accessed 17 February 2007.
19. [http://www.meforum.org/staff.php "Who's Who at Campus Watch"], ''Middle East Forum'' (''meforum.org''), n.d., accessed 15 September 2022.
20. Tanya Schevitz, [http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/09/28/MN227890.DTL "Professors Want Own Names Put on Mideast Blacklist"], ''[[San Francisco Chronicle]]'' 28 September 2002, accessed 17 February 2007.
21. Tanya Schevitz, [http://www.campus-watch.org/article/id/209 "'Dossiers' Dropped from Web Blacklist"], ''[[San Francisco Chronicle]]'' 3 October 2002, accessed 17 February 2007.
22. Hussam Ayloush, [http://www.campus-watch.org/article/id/416 "Column a Slur on Muslim Community"], ''[[Orange County Register]]'' 1 December 2002, accessed 17 February 2007.
23. (7 April 2019). "Missing from the election buzz: How to end the conflict".
24. ""Israel Victory Project" launches new round on Israeli campuses". Israel National News.
25. "Daniel Pipes and the Israel Victory Project - Arab-Israeli Conflict - Jerusalem Post". www.jpost.com.