There’s actually nothing all that interesting in Aaron Klein using his radio to get a member of Hamas to endorse building an Islamic community center near Ground Zero, as WorldNetDaily has promoted (and promoted and promoted). This fundamentally dishonest strategy is how Klein operates.
In 2008, Klein got a member of Hamas to “endorse” Barack Obama for president, and his book “Schmoozing With Terrorists” is filled with such conversations. As we detailed at the time, there’s no evidence that the terrorists he gets to talk to him are aware of his ulterior strategy — to use their words against them to inflame anti-Muslim sentiment in America.
That is likely the case with the Hamas endorsement of the mosque. Of course a group proclaiming itself to be Islamic and anti-American would endorse a mosque in New York — that’s not news. The point is that Klein did this interview with the explicit purpose of using the endorsement to inflame public sentiment against the mosque.
This has nothing to do with Hamas and everything to do with Aaron Klein. This isn’t reporting; it’s nothing more than Klein pressing a key on his Mighty Wurlitzer.
UPDATE: We expand on this a little over at Media Matters, where we also highlight that Klein’s media strategy still relies on the terrorists being too stupid to figure out how he’s using them.