Americans are furious after the famed Empire State Building was seen lit up in the national colors of the Muslim nation of Qatar, only two months after the deadly attack by Hamas terrorists on Southern Israel.
The Empire State Building routinely lights the building in special colors to celebrate one thing or another, of course. And the building’s administrators made the announcement of last weekend’s lighting ceremony on their X account, noting on Sunday that the building was lit up in the burgundy and white colors of Qatar to celebrate the Muslim country’s “National Day.”
Tonight from midnight until sunrise, we will shine in burgundy and white to celebrate Qatar National Day pic.twitter.com/avU8RD1sjN
— Empire State Building (@EmpireStateBldg) December 17, 2023
It is perhaps unsurprising that the Empire State Building chose to observe the Qatari holiday. After all, Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund now owns about 10 percent of the property which is one of America’s most famous skyscrapers.
It was reported in 2016 that Doha put $622 million into the company that owns the building, Doha News reported at the time.
But coming so soon on the tail of a Muslim terror attack on Israel, the timing is not great. And many took to social media to blast the building for its little lighting ceremony, especially since the country of Qatar has been harboring Palestinian terrorists for years.
Qatar funds and harbours terrorists who would like to fly a plane into you.
— Billboard Chris 🇨🇦🇺🇸 (@BillboardChris) December 18, 2023
Should the Empire State Building light up to honor foreign countries?
Qatar… The scumbags who fund terrorism and who hide terrorism leaders who murder Israelis and Americans?! Really?
REALLY?
— Chanah Angelica Kamen (@AngelicaKamen) December 18, 2023
Please don’t endorse a nation with terror tentacles.
— StopAntisemitism (@StopAntisemites) December 18, 2023
Please don’t endorse a nation with terror tentacles.
— StopAntisemitism (@StopAntisemites) December 18, 2023
This is AMERICA. The only colors the Empire State Building should be are RED, WHITE, and BLUE. pic.twitter.com/XB6xawOAry
— Julia 🇺🇸 (@Jules31415) December 18, 2023
The timing was infuriating, for sure. But the naysayers are right that Qatar is a harborer of terrorists. As Joseph Epstein, a legislative fellow for the Endowment of Middle East Truth, noted in Newsweek in October after the Hamas attack on Israel, Qatar has aided and abetted terror for decades. But not just by aiding Hamas, but by funding a long list of other terror groups, as well.
Epstein wrote, “Qatari funds and political support have reportedly made their way to groups like the Janjaweed who carried out the infamous genocide in Darfur, Sudan, to various branches of Al Qaeda, and to the Taliban. According to a 2017 congressional hearing, a top Qatari official ‘provided support’ to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks. Top U.S. officials have said that Qatar created a ‘permissive terrorist financing environment.’”
Qatar denies all this, but the evidence is not on their side, Epstein noted.
“Its government openly houses Hamas leaders and uses the state-funded channel Al Jazeera to carry out one of the largest propaganda campaigns against Israel in both the Middle East and the West. Qatar is also one of the largest funders of Gaza, pumping more than $1 billion into the Hamas-run territory,” Epstein added.
Epstein is hardly alone in suggesting that the U.S. and other Western nations need to treat Qatar as hostile. Meir Ben Shabbat, the head of the Misgav Institute for National Security and Zionist Strategy, and Asher Fredman, a Senior Fellow at the Misgav Institute, wrote in The Hill this month that “Qatar has been a prime sponsor of Hamas” and needs to be held accountable.
The Middle East Media Research Institute, which translates Middle Eastern news sources into English, also reported this month that Qatar is not an American ally, despite Washington’s glad handling of the oil-rich nation.
Sadly, the one reason the U.S. usually turns a blind eye to Qatar’s sponsoring of terror is because of that oil. Qatar produces approximately 1.3 million barrels of oil per day, making the country one of the top 15 oil exporting countries in the world. It is also one of the world’s major fertilizer producers. So, Washington has a vested interest in maintaining smooth waters with Qatar.
Qatar’s detractors are right. It is long past time to hold them accountable for the misery they have exported across the world in their sponsorship of Islamofascist terror. And the detractors of the Empire State Building are also right. Lighting the building in the colors of one of the world’s worst enemies is an outrage.
