Category Archives: USA

Geller and friends commemorate 9/11

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Mohammed was a terrorist placard

“There is no smiley face, no whitewash on what happened here ten years ago today. What happened, was murder!” As she peppered her speech with soundbites, Pamela Geller was occasionally forced to pause for chants of “U-S-A!” from the smattering of supporters who had turned out for her Freedom Rally yesterday in Lower Manhattan. It was doubtful that there were any “smiley faces” at the official commemoration at the 9/11 Memorial that morning, but if you spoke with attendees of the Freedom Rally, one might have gotten the impression that Presidents Obama and Bush presided over a mass burning of Bibles and bald eagles.

“This country has become communist,” Sheepshead Bay resident Patricia Randolph told us. “A good way to fight for freedom is to know your history, to know that Muslims build victory mosques in places that they have conquered.” She was referring of course to Park51 a cultural center and mosque that may be built blocks from the World Trade Center site. “And have you heard about that mosque they’re building in Sheepshead Bay near a school? Those women that walk around my neighborhood with black nails? They’re Taliban wives.” Her friend Elizabeth of Midwood added, “The Muslims rape little girls, we have to make it safe for the kids.”

Gothamist, 12 September 2011

See also Media Matters, 12 September 2011

Commons Select Committee invites US Islamophobe to testify about Muslim radicalisation

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Tomorrow, the British Parliament will hold a hearing on the “roots of violent radicalisation” in the Muslim community in that country. The first witness before the committee will be Rep. Peter King (R-NY). King will reportedly be the first member of Congress to ever address a committee of Parliament….

King, who has said Muslims are “an enemy living among us” and that there are “too many mosques in this country,” is not an appropriate “expert” to testify about radicalization in the United States. Additionally, multiple witnesses that King had wanted to call during his own investigation had to withdraw or be dis-invited due to their anti-Muslim bias. One witness withdrew because he was involved with a militia that tortured and killed Muslims, and another was rejected because of her stridently anti-Muslim views targeting not just extremism but the religion itself.

Despite the fact that almost twice as many terror plots since 9/11 came from non-Muslim groups, King refused to widen his hearings to examine radicalization in other areas. He even questioned the patriotism of Muslims in the United States, accusing the community of not cooperating with law enforcement authorities – despite the fact that around a third of terror plots that have been broken up since the 9/11 attacks were broken up with the help and assistance of Muslim American communities.

Zaid Jilani at Think Progress, 12 September 2011

Resisting Islamophobia in Rutherford County

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Rutherford Reader 9-11Over at the Huffington Post Janell Ross profiles Anthony Mijares, a Roman Catholic pensioner who has waged an admirable one-man campaign to persuade businesses and shops to boycott the Rutherford Reader, a rabidly Islamophobic free weekly newspaper that has played a prominent role in the right-wing propaganda war against the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro.

Ross quotes Peter Doughtie – the editor, publisher and owner of the Reader – as writing in last week’s issue:

“Muslims are not in America to assimilate. They are here to change our system…. Our preachers should go beyond telling us more than ‘we must love our enemies.’ That is simply passing the buck. They should be getting every Christian ready and armed with the Word of God and an understanding of the Quran and Hadith, to defeat those who are out to destroy Christianity, and our American way of life.”

The current edition of the Reader features a front page photomontage of the 9/11 attacks with the headline “We Will Never Forget”. Inside the paper a guest column by Pastor Darrel Whaley of the Kingdom Ministries Worship Center begins: “How can we forget 9/11 when the actions of Muslims, led by the teachings of Islam, continue to remind us. The United States alone has been under attack the past ten years on forty different occasions.” (Pastor Whaley’s further thoughts on Islam, Muslims and the Murfreesboro Islamic Center can be found here. For example: “There’s over twenty thousand Muslims in Middle Tennessee. But as the percentages of Muslims gets greater, a greater saturation, the possibility of them getting radical is going to increase. Because that’s the purpose of it – they want to take over America and the whole world.”)

Another columnist – one Tom Murrah of Toolsmartz, a blog that combines the promotion of evangelical Christianity with fascinating posts on the technicalities of woodworking machinery – writes: “In my opinion, those who attacked us on 9-11 were not ‘Islamic Radicals’ as everyone wants to paint them. They were true-blue followers of Islam. ‘Fundamentalists’? Yes you could call them that. They are following the message of the Quran, faithfully.” As for the claim that the Muslims involved in the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro are peaceful, “perhaps they are simply following the Quran and lying to us”.

The paper also includes two articles by Bill Warner of the Center for the Study of Political Islam, publishers of the handy 50-page guide Sharia Law for Non-Muslims (“If you want to lobby against Islam with any legislator, councilman, school board member, or politician, then Sharia Law for Non-Muslims is the perfect tool”). And another comment piece raises the scary prospect of a Muslim contesting the 2012 US presidential election (“President Abdul Hassan? It Could Happen!”)

In response to Anthony Mijares’s campaign the Rutherford Reader has run a series of full-page ads attacking him, and even published his home address – in circumstances where opponents of the Murfreesboro anti-mosque campaign have received death threats. But Mijares has refused to be intimidated. If there were an award for resisting Islamophobia in the US, then Anthony Mijares would surely be on the list of nominees.

Poll: American views on Islam closely follow party affiliation

Posted on by Bob Pitt

PRRI

A comprehensive new report by the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) and the Brookings Institution reveals a deeply divided American public when it comes to Islam and the place of Muslims in the United States. The survey – “What it means to be American: Attitudes in an increasingly diverse America ten years after 9/11” – shows that “Americans are struggling to reconcile principles of religious liberty and the inclusion of new groups in America with specific discomfort and fears, particularly around American Muslims and Islam,” says Robert P. Jones, CEO of PRRI.

Some 47 percent of all Americans, according to the poll, believe that the values of Islam are at odds with American values and way of life. And the splits along ideological lines reveal a deeply divided public. Large majorities of Republicans (63 percent) and people who identify with the Tea Party (66 percent) say that Islamic values are in contrast with American values. At the same time, however, a majority of Democrats (55 percent) and independents (53 percent) disagree with that view.

Examiner.com, 8 September 2011

See also PRRI website

Download the report here

Islamophobia: Thought Crime of the Totalitarian Future

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Islamophobia Thought Crime of the Totalitarian FutureFrontPage Magazine reports that David Horowitz and Robert Spencer have a new book out:

In their new pamphlet, Islamophobia: Thought Crime of the Totalitarian Future, Horowitz and Spencer have created what amounts to a biography of this malign concept.

Their work shows how the term “Islamophobia” originated with the Muslim Brotherhood, is connected to violent protests over cartoons about Mohammed, the growing number of blasphemy laws in Europe, resolutions against this “form of racism” in the UN, and prosecutions of notable opponents of Islamic terror such as Oriana Fallaci and Geert Wilders.

They show, too, how what began as a political strategy by the Muslim Brotherhood has now spread to American higher education and has, like political correctness and other such mad experiments cultured in the campus laboratory, the potential to break out into the larger political culture.

We can only hope.

Terry Jones returns to Michigan to denounce Islam

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Terry Jones, the controversial Florida pastor, returned to Michigan on a rainy Wednesday night for a 30-minute speech on the steps of the Capitol where he railed about radical Islam. The pastor’s speech was greeted by more police, media and protesters than supporters or curious onlookers.

About a dozen protesters started chanting “Say No to Hate” during Jones’ speech before police quieted them down. “Terry Jones is not welcome here,” said protester David Mitchell, 30, of Lansing, who held a banner with others saying: “They shall not pass.”

Jones, wearing jeans and a Harley Davidson black bomber jacket, decried Islam as a not a peaceful religion and oppressive to women. The Islamic law, Sharia, should not be tolerated, he said. “Islam is a religion that hates freedom of speech,” Jones said.

He was in Lansing to support a new organization, Operation Freedom’s Tree, founded by James Terpening. The political group denounces Islam as evil.

Jones supporter Eugene Connors, 40, of Lansing agrees. One sign he held said: “Stop Burning Christians.” “People don’t realize the threat Islam poses to everyone,” he said.

Detroit News, 7 September 2011

Justice Department upholds religious freedom in Virginia mosque construction dispute

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The U.S. Justice Department on Tuesday (Sept. 6) announced a settlement with Henrico County, Va., over the county’s alleged violation of a federal anti-discrimination law when it refused to rezone property for a group of Muslims who wanted to build a mosque.

The Justice Department claimed the county’s actions violated the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000 (RLUIPA), which prohibits religious discrimination in land use and zoning decisions. The settlement requires the county to allow the mosque to be built without improper interference or delay.

“Religious freedom is one of our most cherished rights, and that right includes the ability to assemble and build places of worship without facing discrimination,” said Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Thomas Perez.

The case arose in late 2008 when local Muslims were denied the ability to build the first mosque in the county, just north of Richmond. The Muslims filed suit, charging that the denial of the request was “arbitrary, capricious, and unreasonable.”

The Justice Department joined the case in March 2010 and found evidence that the request to build had been denied on the basis of hostility toward Muslims. The county had never turned down a rezoning application submitted by one of its 209 Christian churches, government attorneys said.

The settlement requires Henrico County to publicize its nondiscrimination policies and to provide training on RLUIPA to all county officials involved in land use matters.

“This agreement will ensure that religious freedom is upheld in Henrico County,” said Neil H. MacBride, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.

Religion News Service, 7 September 2011

Most Americans still think Muslims are singled out unfairly, poll finds

Posted on by Bob Pitt

CBS-NYT pollMore than three in four Americans say it is likely that Muslims, Arab Americans and immigrants from the Middle East get unfairly singled out in the United States, according to a new CBS News/New York Times poll taken in conjunction with the ten-year anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Twenty-nine percent of Americans – including 35 percent of New Yorkers – said it’s very likely that people in those groups are singled out unfairly. Another 49 percent called it somewhat likely. Eighteen percent said they did not think such singling out is taking place.

Democrats and younger Americans were more likely than Republicans, independents and older Americans to say people in these groups are being unfairly singled out.

Shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks, a full 90 percent of Americans said it was at least somewhat likely that Muslims, Arab Americans and immigrants from the Middle East would be unfairly singled out – including 50 percent who said it was very likely. That figure fell to 80 percent in Sept. 2002, and it stands at 78 percent today.

CBS News, 8 September 2011

Billboards tell stories of Michigan Muslims

Posted on by Bob Pitt

CAIR American Muslims billboard

Billboards are going up around Metro Detroit highlighting contributions by Michigan Muslims as the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks nears.

The “Remember Through Service” campaign by the Council on American-Islamic Relations – Michigan will run for a month. The billboards are up in Wayne and Oakland counties, and a third will be up by this weekend on the Lodge near Seven Mile Road.

“As we reflect on the 10th anniversary of the national tragedy of 9/11, it is important for all Americans to recognize the positive contributions that Muslims have always made to our society,” CAIR-MI Executive Director Dawud Walid said. “Our fellow Americans need to know that we are first responders, law enforcement officers and military veterans who serve and protect our nation like citizens of other faiths.”

The billboards feature a doctor who was a first responder at Ground Zero in New York City on Sept. 11, 2001; a Detroit police officer; a Wayne County assistant prosecuting attorney; an assistant principal in a Canton public school; a Vietnam veteran; and a volunteer doctor at a free medical clinic in Wayne.

The campaign is designed to tell the stories of Michigan Muslims and their contributions to society, Walid said.

Detroit News, 7 September 2011

See also CAIR press release, 7 September 2011