That's the claim from the legal watchdog group Judicial Watch, which has filed a complaint with IRS Commissioner, Clinton holdover Charles Rossotti, charging that Osama bin Laden's al Qaida network, Hamas and others continue to use tax-exempt U.S.-based charities to bankroll terror, unencumbered by even the hint of an audit.
At least 16 U.S.-based non-profit entities have been linked financially to bin Laden, the legal watchdog group says.
The decision not to investigate these groups is especially difficult to understand given that the information in the Judicial Watch complaint is hardly a state secret. On the contrary, the complaint is based largely on reports published over the last three years in venues like the New York Times.
One such questionable non-profit, the Islamic African Relief Agency (IARA), has been directly linked to earlier attacks on U.S. interests by bin Laden.
"IARA reportedly transferred money to Mercy International, another non-profit Muslim organization that purchased vehicles used by Osama bin Laden to bomb the U.S. embassies in both Kenya and Tanzania on August 8, 1998," the complaint notes.
Not only did Rossotti & Co. not investigate, that same year the Clinton State Department showered the IARA with $4.2 million in grants.
Other non-profits said by Judicial Watch to have ties to Hamas include:
In Boston - the same city where two hijacked planes departed before slamming into the World Trade Center nearly two weeks ago - Mrs. Clinton held a June 13, 2000, fundraiser hosted by the American Muslim Alliance.
According to a report on the group's website, "The reception was attended by nearly 100 American Muslim leaders and activists."
As NewsMax.com reported at the time, candidate Clinton "clearly understood that her hosts were concerned that the U.S. war on terrorism might be too harsh." In her speech, "Mrs. Clinton vowed to pursue fairness and justice in the issue of secret evidence and the Anti-Terrorism Act," the AMA website noted.
At the Boston event, the former first lady accepted a $1,000 contribution from Abdurahman Alamoudi, an official with the American Muslim Council who once vowed to eliminate Israel and had previously boasted, "We are the ones who went to the [Clinton] White House and defended what is called Hamas."
When Mrs. Clinton's campaign reported Alamoudi's American Muslim Council donation to the FEC, the AMC was camouflaged as the "American Museum Council." Alamoudi had pledged his $1,000 at a fundraiser held a month earlier at the Washington, D.C., mansion of Yasser Arafat crony Hani Masri - a gathering Mrs. Clinton's campaign went to great lengths to conceal. "The event, which sources said raised more than $50,000, was closed to the press, which wouldn't have known about the event anyway, since it wasn't listed on Mrs. Clinton's public schedule," the Jewish Forward reported at the time.
Sooner or later someone's bound to start asking: Was Mrs. Clinton's active fundraising within the radical Islamic community behind the Clinton IRS's decision to take a pass on tax exempt groups with ties to terrorists?
