Our Mideast Faith project is NOT by the American Islamic Congress!
I was surprised to stumble upon this page where our hard work was credited by an organization which I personally consider to be entirely corrupt. I don’t care if anyone runs around claiming various websites as their own despite having absolutely nothing to do with it, but to actually get funding from such revolting lies is something else.
MEFaith.com, which the American Islamic Congress (AIC) inaccurately considers to be its own “web portal,” was created, designed, developed and continues to be maintained by the Mideast Youth team. To prevent any confusion we have redirected our website to MideastFaith.org even if we have to re-market ourselves. This is to make sure that no one buys AIC’s false and shameless PR, and for visitors to understand that this site is an independent project, not affiliated with any other organization despite what anyone says (for the sake of cash!)
Inter-Iman.com, which AIC also claims as its own, is a personal website of mine that I created with our then-developer Lalith as an experiment for Arabic interfaith dialogue, specifically amongst minorities, and later placed it under the supervision of Mideast Youth because of interest within this community. Due to lack of funding and volunteers we decided it’s not strong enough to exist hence why it’s on a hiatus until we have enough helping hands to deal with it.
Not convinced? Other than the fact that our logos are on the site and that half of the content is from Mideast Youth and its many authors, here is the relevant proof:
Paid for by yours truly, using my personal cash. No ideological agenda, no politics, no theft, unlike what AIC stands for.
For an organization like AIC (which operates on a budget that exceeds 700k a year) to list itself publicly on the web as the organization behind our hard work, and getting funding from it, is just completely sick. It is against human nature to be this incredibly unethical. Why would anyone want to take complete advantage of young people who try to do some good?
Why don’t foundations check which projects belong to whom before they actually fund the organization that claims to be behind it? I am appalled at the amount of corruption that exists within the NGO world. It is deeply disturbing.
Ironically AIC claims to be for “human rights.” But it’s really a PR agency whose values center around fame, fortune, and really bad politics (pro-Bush, pro-U.S involvement in the Middle East, freakishly close to the U.S government – it’s hardly about interfaith at all.) If this weren’t the case, they would have collaborated with us on this, which they had refused to do, most likely because they understand that they are at fault here and might be too embarrassed to admit it. But with us being an independent, non-funded project, they feel we are too weak to actually fight for our hard work. They’re wrong.
We want our credit. Stop lying, for the sake of your own credibility as an organization (which, regionally, you have none.) Is that really too much for us to ask for? This political organization is incredibly dangerous and we literally risk our lives if we were affiliated, our security’s certainly not worth risking considering the fact that the affiliation is completely FALSE.
Readers, please take a minute and protest by using this form and requesting that this FALSE affiliation be removed immediately from this website.
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I spent hours designing and writing a plugin for WP for this project on my own time and never got a cent from AIC, but they now claim its theirs? Hmmm…
OK I just visited the USIP website and this is sad and fraud. We going to have to talk to a lawyer.
These guys have enough cash to do whatever they want, I don’t know why they resort to this cheap theft. They make in one year what my entire city makes every decade:
Contributions – £290,843
Government Grants – £470,788 [WTF!]
Program Services – £0
Investments – £0
Special Events – £0
Sales – £0
Other – £0
Total Revenue – £761,631 (U.S Dollars 1,171,691)
Oh and look. Our dear site is listed as their achievement in this document:
They can keep their dirty cash which they evidently receive from false grant requests – I want these URLs removed from every single webpage that claims it’s run by them. I also want proof from USIP that they have followed up with AIC to request what actually happened with this grant, and to do with the answer what needs to be done: get the money back, if it wasn’t already done so. AIC isn’t replying to any emails, and apparently their Executive Director ordered her staff not to cooperate with us on this investigation. I want USIP to just guarantee that no one was actually making any money from our work and to also remove the false affiliation from their website. Two very reasonable requests!
If the financial source I linked to is indeed true, which is likely, then can someone tell me why a 1+ million dollar organization is applying for further GRANTS.
If this foundation is located in America you should see an intellectual property lawyer. Our IP laws are very strict and this seems like a form of copyright infringement. You might be able to win a small settlement. The problem is gettting the lawyer to work on contingency.
Even if you can’t get a lawyer, I think you are still able to press charges. As an organization with only $1 million, they are not going to want to spend money on a lawyer who charges $500 an hour. The lawyer would start drying up their revenue stream in a matter of weeks – not to mention the bad publicity.
Hi Esra’a,
So bad, so cheap that they claim what you and your friends here have achieved, but it really shows how successful and how revolutionary the idea of interfaith and Middle Eastern dialogue of the youth had been, congratulations dear Esra’a
It’s terrible that the AIC would take credit for this. While I have a generally good opinion of USIP and the work they do, I will be very interested to know the follow-up to this post and if USIP responds to any of your requests.
Normally, grant-giving organizations (especially those federally funded) do follow up with the recipient org, so it is surprising to me that AIC was able to so bodly claim ownership with no one checking that fact.
Also, as for as why a $1 mil foundation would apply for grants, that’s simple – why not? If there is money available even largest organizations will still apply, and many times the org giving the money wants proof of fiscal responsibility – so unfortunately small orgs have a hard time starting out while larger orgs already have a foot in the door. Plus, AIC’s name in itself is very attractive, quasi-governmental (or even private non-religious or interfaith orgs) would jump at the chance to “prove” they are not anti-Muslim.
Esra’a, have you thought about applying for a grant from USIP yourself? This is one very simple, cheap way to directly show USIP that you, and not AIC, are responsible for the content of the sites. I understand the problems associated with actually taking grant money from USIP, but you could always decline it if offered. Either way, someone on the other end would be reading your information and would hopefully realize the truth.
This is not only a quesiton of copyright infringement, but also of fraud. USIP is funded by American taxpayers, so if enough US citizens write to their Congressman complaining about grants given to AIC on this basis, something might – just maybe – change.
Which is why there is a slight possibility that the money was returned, and that no one bothered to update the site accordingly. However, we care about that, because our credibility is on the line here. There are several emails that have been sent, and I was too busy today to make a phone call. But I have people on top of this case and we’ll get it sorted.
That may be the case in the USA, but they are amongst the least credible sources in the Middle East, and its Executive Director is extremely close to the Bush administration and has been known to praise U.S militarism in the region (very easy to do when you’re living comfortably in Washington DC.) No one here trusts or likes them, and it’s not impossible to see why. To be associated with such group is frankly an insult.
No, we try to stay away from these types of institutions. We are applying mostly to media-related, or European based grant-givers, in order to guarantee our total independence. For example, an American media organization whose mission is the empower people through the web, is something we apply for. But a politically charged organization is something we never allow ourselves to get involved with.
Finding funding is easy, like my colleague Tori says, “if you rely on money from the state department, you get fat really fast.” That’s why AIC is a $1million+ organization, and I am confident they don’t have any freedom at all to do what they want. Finding responsible funding, where you are still the boss of your own organization, is incredibly challenging. We have a code of ethics and will stick by it, that means having to stay away from funders like USIP.
I’d rather get 100k a year than 100 million a year and wake up every morning knowing that I’m doing my job sincerely instead of having to serve anyone’s petty agenda. Sadly AIC can’t say the same. Maybe that’s why they steal things.
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AIC and USIP has yet to respond to my emails, I gave them till tomorrow then I’ll phone them and if that doesn’t get things turning then a letter from a lawyer will get to them and then we take it from there.
This is utterly reprehensible, and you have every right to be pissed off about it.
I remmber u used 2 work 2gether with American Islamic Congress. Wat happened?
This is a common misconception. I never worked for or with AIC. I attended two of their conferences, just like many other people did, who also eventually saw them for who they really are and kept their distance. I have not been associated with their work in any way for years.
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