Friends Obama Has Denied Knowing: Rashid Khalidi, Willima Ayers--And Now Tareq Salahi (Updated)

In a post from last year, Ayers Is Not The Only Friendship Obama Denies, I noted that back in Chicago, the Obamas were friendly with the Khalidis and the Ayers'--one with ties to Palestinian terrorists, the others wanted in the US for domestic terrorism.

We also know that Obama made a point of downplaying as coincidental this ongoing friendship.

And that brings us to the Salahis--who seem to have crashed Obama's State Dinner.

But, according to the Canada Free Press:

“Party Crashers” had five-year relationship with Obama before state dinner

While the big gun media and American Secret Service are out there investigating “party crashers” Tareq and Michaele Salahi, no one’s telling the truth: Obama knew the Salahis when he was still an Illinois senator.

Polo Contacts Worldwide could make it easy for the investigating Secret Service by brown-enveloping them this picture:

The picture is from Polo Contacts Worldwide, which ran the picture on November 26, 2008 under the headline:

Americas Polo Cup Pre-Event - Invite Only - with President Elect Obama and Black Eyed Peas

According to Canada Free Press, this picture was taken while Obama was still just Senator--back in June 2005. So how does CFP know that the Polo Contacts site has it wrong?

This is where reading The Da Vinci Code comes in handy--if you go to that page on PCW and right-click on the image and save the image to your desktop, the name of the image is: ROCKTHEVOTEJune82005014.jpg

And yes, Obama and The Black Eyed Peas--with whom he is pictured above--were at the Rock The Vote Awards that year.

So why should Tareq Salahi rate along with Rashid Khalidi, Willima Ayers?
Just check out The American Task Force On Palestine:


click image to enlarge

OOPS! That's what it looks like now.
But if you look at the cache of that page in Google:


click image to enlarge

(Hat tip: Canada Free Press)

As Boker Tov, Boulder points out--this is not the first time the ATFP has felt the need to airbrush their website.

And yes, this more than just a question of:

Mr. Salahi travels the world as the Team Captain for the United States Polo Team and represents both the United States and Palestine on his diplomatic polo tours.

According to the blog, American Power, the American Task Force on Palestine (ATFP) is:

a pro-Palestine lobby demanding the “right of return” for all Palestinian refugees and their descendants. The “right of return” has long been considered the backdoor to Israel’s destruction. But not only that: ATFP President Ziad Asali is an America-basher who blamed 9/11 on U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Asali was a lead U.S. official to PLO terrorist Yassir Arafat’s funeral in 2004. And in a position paper in 2007, the ATFP called for a power-sharing agreement at the Palestinian Authority, which would have included the State Department’s designated-terrorist group, Hamas.

The same blog found notes that Obama's friend Rashid Khalidi also has ties to the ATFP:

According to Discover the Networks, ATFP’s former vice president is Rashid Khalidi, the Columbia University Middle East Studies professor and militant Palestinian rights activist. Khalidi cites the late Edward Said as his major influence, and according to the entry cited, “As with Said before him, Khalidi’s involvement with the Palestinian cause goes beyond mere support.” And, “Khalidi so strongly identified with the aims of the PLO, which was designated as a terrorist group by the State Department during Khalidi’s affiliation with it in the 1980s, that he repeatedly referred to himself as ‘we’ when expounding on the PLO’s agenda.” Also, according to Campus Watch, ATFP remains in full support Kahlidi, for example, during charges of academic misconduct in 2005, at the time of Senator Barack Obama’s meeting with Tareq Salahi. See, “ATFP EXPRESSES FULL SUPPORT FOR COLUMBIA PROFESSOR RASHID KHALIDI.

(Hat tip: Gateway Pundit)

The question is not how the the Salahi's crashed the party.
The question is just how friendly the Salahis and Obamas actually are.

UPDATE: A cached copy of the Board of the ATFP shows that Tareq Salahi was a member:



As opposed to now:



(Hat tip: Kabobfest)

Technorati Tag: Obama and Tareq Salahi.