New Black Panthers

The neutrality of this article is disputed. Please see the discussion on the .(December 2007) Please do not remove this message until the dispute is resolved.

New Black Panther`s Logo

The New Black Panthers or New Black Panther Party (NBPP), whose formal name is the New Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, is a U.S.-based organization founded in Dallas, Texas in 1989

The NBPP attracted many breakaway members of the Nation of Islam when former NOI minister Khalid Abdul Muhammad became the national chairman of the group from the late 1990s until his death in 2001. The NBPP is currently led by Malik Zulu Shabazz. The party still upholds Khalid Abdul Muhammad as the de facto father of their movement.

Background

With the Black Panther Party in shambles, in 1987 an alderman in Milwaukee threatened in frustration to disrupt white events throughout the city unless more jobs were created for black people. A "state of the inner city" press conference in 1990 at city hall brought this situation to a head as the alderman, McGee, announced the creation of the Black Panther Militia, which inspired Aaron Michaels, a community activist and radio producer, to establish the New Black Panther Party. Michaels rose to widespread attention for the first time when he called on blacks to use shotguns and rifles to protest against the chairman of a school board who had been taped calling black students "little niggers". [2] In 1998 Khalid Abdul Muhammad brought the organization into the national spotlight when he led the group to intervene in response to the 1998 murder of James Byrd in Jasper, TX. He also made the NBPP well-known for their vehement school board disruptions and public appearances. Members of the original Black Panther Party have insisted that this party is illegitimate and have vociferously objected that there "is no new Black Panther Party".^[1]

Philosophy, ideology, and criticism

The New Black Panther Party self-identifies with the original Black Panther Party and claims to uphold its legacy. It also says that many others see the organization this same way. But the NBPP is apparently largely seen by both the general public and by prominent members of the original party ^[2]as wholly illegitimate and even charlatan. Huey Newton Foundation members, containing a significant number of the original party's leaders, once successfully sued the group, though their ultimate objective in doing so — to prevent the NBPP from using the Panther name — appears to have been unsuccessful. In response to the suit, Aaron Michaels branded the original Panthers "has-been wannabe Panthers", adding: "Nobody can tell us who we can call ourselves." [3]

The New Black Panthers defend their beliefs on Hannity & Colmes

Although it says it sees capitalism as the fundamental problem with the world and "revolution" as the solution, the new party does not draw its influences from Marxism or Maoism as the original party did. Instead, in a carefully-worded, roundabout form of ethnic nationalism, [4] they say that Marx himself based his ideology and teachings on indigenous African cultures, and that the NBPP therefore need not look to Marxism or Maoism as a basis for their program, but can look to ideologies that stem directly from those African origins. [5] Although many groups subscribing to varying degrees of radicalism have called for the "right to self-determination" for blacks, particularly U.S. blacks, critics of the NBPP say that it represents a dangerous departure from the original; specifically, that it is anti-white and anti-Semitic. The NBPP is considered by the Southern Poverty Law Center to be a black racist hate group, and even many of the mildest critics of the organization seem to believe that, at the very least, the NBPP's provocative brand of black nationalism undermines other civil rights efforts. Members have referred to "bloodsucking Jews", and Khalid Abdul Muhammad "has blamed slavery and even the Holocaust on the 'hooked-nose, bagel-eating, lox-eating, perpetrating-a-fraud, so-called Jew'." [6], [7], [8] The Southern Poverty Law Center is also an intense NBPP critic, as NBPP members have stated sympathy or understanding of Kamau Kambon's advocacy of the racial genocide of whites on Hannity & Colmes, and Khalid Abdul Muhammad has stated that "there are no good crackers, and if you find one, kill him before he changes." [9], [10], [11]

Recent controversies

Critics characterize what they see as the NBPP's actively destructive extremism by pointing to examples such as Muhammad's "Million Youth March", a youth equivalent of the Million Man March in Harlem in which 6000 people protested police brutality but also featured a range of speakers calling for the extermination of whites in South Africa. The rally ended in scuffles with the NYPD as Muhammad urged the crowd to attack those officers who had attempted to confiscate the NBPP members' guns. Chairs and bottles were thrown at the police but only a few in the conflict suffered injuries. Perhaps more significantly was the fact that Al Sharpton appeared and spoke at this event, and was criticized later for taking part in its controversial rhetoric. The Million Youth March became an annual event thereafter, but rapidly lost popularity as time progressed. Following the September 11, 2001 attacks in New York City and Washington, DC, the party promoted the 9/11 conspiracy theory that 4,000 Israelis who worked at the World Trade Center were warned ahead of time by the State of Israel and called in sick the day of the attack — a theory made most widely known by Amiri Baraka in his poem "Somebody Blew Up America." [12] The party also participated in the Reparations marches on Washington in 2002 that drew crowds of tens of thousands of African-Americans from around the United States. The New Black Panther Party provoked a melee outside of Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney's campaign headquarters after she had lost a Democratic primary to her opponent, Hank Johnson. The NBPP's Chief of Staff, Hashim Nzinga, had been acting as security detail for the Congresswoman when, in a volatile confrontation, he physically attacked reporters, derogatorily calling them "Jews" and insisting that they must focus on Hank Johnson rather than on McKinney, since Johnson, he alleged, was a "Tom". [13] In a subsequent appearance on the Fox News Channel program Hannity & Colmes, Nzinga vociferously defended these actions and further accused his interviewers of being part of a Zionist media complex bent on defaming African-Americans and, by extension, the New Black Panthers. Earlier in 2006, the New Black Panther Party regained the media spotlight by interpolating itself into the 2006 Duke University lacrosse team scandal, organizing marches outside of Duke University and made numerous media appearances where they demanded that the jury organized by District Attorney Nifong convict the accused lacrosse players. [14] Malik Zulu Shabazz met with the DA and asserted repeatedly that the DA's answers meant he was supporting the claims made by the NBPP, a point that was widely disputed. On April 12, 2007,After District Attorny Nifong's case collapsed and the Duke Lacrosse players were exonerated, Malik Zulu Shabazz appeared on the O'Reilly Factor and declared that he would not apologize for his actions in the leadup to the Duke University lacrosse rape scandal, stating that he did not know whether or not anything happened to the young accuser. He stated his beliefs that the rich, white families of Duke had placed political pressure on the investigation and forced the charges to be dropped. When confronted by guest host Michelle Malkin with the facts of the case, he labeled her a "political prostitute" and "mouthpiece for that racist Bill O'Reilly." In response, Malkin stated that "the only whore present is you." On May 15, 2007, Malik Zulu Shabazz was prevented from entering Canada by officials at Toronto Pearson International Airport due to a five-year-old misdemeanor offense. He was scheduled to lead events at Queen's Park and Ryerson University.^[3] The rally continued, and existed primarily as a platform for the Nation of Islam, who unsuccessfully attempted to hold a meeting later that evening at Ryerson.

References

1. ^ "There is No New Black Panther Party: An Open Letter from the Dr. Huey P. Newton Foundation" [1]
2. ^ Huey P. Newton Foundation, There Is No New Black Panther Party: An Open Letter From the Dr. Huey P. Newton Foundation
3. ^ Black activist blocked at border

• CATS CAME BACK: Can the Black Panther Party become a force again in Philadelphia?
• Weekly 2003 Dec 17th
• Local Objectives
• Point Platform
• Extremism in America

See also

• Black Panther Party
• Black nationalism
• Black power
• Black supremacy
• Ethnic nationalism
• Anti-Europeanism
• Anti-Semitism
• Nation of Islam
• Garveyism

External links

• Interview with NBPP Chairman Malik Zulu Shabazz
• Official Website of the New Black Panther Party
• "There Is No New Black Panther Party", An Open Letter From the Dr. Huey Newton|Huey P. Newton Foundation
• FrontPageMag: "New Black Panther Mouthpiece" article