Associated Press is reporting that a Dallas charity known as Kids in Need of Development, Education and Relief (KinderUSA) has dropped a lawsuit against a former U.S. Treasury Department official over a passage from his book on Hamas that linked KinderUSA to the Holy Land Foundation, currently on trial charged with the financing of Hamas. The lawsuit also named Yale University Press and the Washington Institute for Near East Policy for publishing the book. It should be noted that Riad Abdelkarim was a Chairman of the KinderUSA board as well as a Holy Foundation board member (see note). He was also the Western Region communications director for the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), a U.S. Muslim Brotherhood group that , as previous posts have discussed, has strongly supported the Holy Land Foundation.
(note: Los Angeles Times December 7, 2001 Friday fHome Edition “Muslim Leaders Back FBI-Targeted Charity; Islam: The Holy Land Foundation was shut down, some say unfairly, for alleged Hamas links.” SECTION: CALIFORNIA; Part 2; Metro Desk; Pg. 1 )