Maryland Attorney General Reinstates Suspended Hate-Crime Commissioner Who Compared Israel to Nazi Germany

Less than a month after Zainab Chaudry was suspended from Maryland’s hate-crime commission for posting antisemitic comments on Facebook, Attorney General Anthony Brown has reinstated her.

Chaudry is the Council on Islamic Foreign Relations’ executive director and was temporarily suspended from Maryland’s hate-crime commission on November 21, after comparing Israel to Nazi Germany on social media. The commission is supposed to “develop strategies to prevent and respond to hate crime activity and evaluate state laws and policies relating to hate crimes.” Chaudry is one of commission’s 20 stakeholders.

Although Brown said in November that Chaudry’s social-media posts — including a post that criticized “the world” for “[summoning] up rage for 40 fake Israeli babies” — disrupted the work and mission of the commission, the attorney general announced on Wednesday that he did not have legal authority to permanently suspend Chaudry. The commission will instead draft guidelines for panelists regarding personal communications.

While Brown insists he lacks the authority to expel Chaudry, the bill that created the commission stipulates that its members are appointed by the attorney general and that the attorney general is the chair of the commission.

“While we understand that legal technicalities are tying the Attorney General’s hands, it’s incredibly disturbing that someone who has posted such hateful, anti-Jewish things on social media is back on a commission intended to fight hate crimes in Maryland,” Howard Libit, the executive director of the Baltimore Jewish Council told WMAR-2. “To deny the brutal killings of so many Jewish children, and to use so many hateful references to the Holocaust, suggests that this member of the commission is more focused on promoting hate than fighting against it.”

Chaudry hasn’t let up on social media since her suspension; she recently said on Facebook that “standing with Palestine means standing on the right side of history” and that “Israel is committing war crimes with billions of our tax dollars.” On Tuesday, she also reposted a United Nation representative’s quote that read, “You cannot build a Holy Land for your children on the mass graves of other children.”

CAIR’s national organization applauded Chaudry’s reinstatement and called outcry over the official’s comments “defamatory” and “dangerous.”

“We welcome Attorney General Anthony Brown’s decision to reinstate the appointment. We also appreciate the productive conversations we have held with Attorney General Brown and his staff over the past few weeks,” CAIR Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell said. “We agree that it is important for the commission to collaboratively develop additional guidelines and we look forward to upholding those guidelines, which must apply consistently to all commissioners.”

“We thank the thousands of community members, leaders, students and allies who contacted Attorney General Brown urging him to reverse this decision,” Mitchell continued. “CAIR’s Maryland Director Zainab Chaudry looks forward to continuing the critical work of representing the state’s Muslim communities and addressing hate bias, including both Islamophobia and antisemitism, while also advocating justice for all communities here and abroad.”