The Hamas-founded Council on American-Islamic Relations has long pretended to be a civil rights organization, comparing itself at times to the NAACP, but a close look at its record reveals the real CAIR agenda to be – in common with all Islamists – promoting the Shari'a. This can be achieved two ways. The more circuitous method influences American public opinion through the educational system, the media, the arts, the courts, and the political process. The more direct method converts Americans to Islam.