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May 23, 2007
Muslim Public Affairs Council Issues Another Deceptive Urgent Advisory
Yesterday, LGF pointed a story in The Arab American News that warns its Islamic readers to watch out for a violent backlash (one that never comes but "Islamist" groups like MPAC and CAIR keep warning about, nonetheless), in the wake of another thwarted Islamic terror plot.
DEARBORN -- The Muslim Public Affairs Council has issued an urgent advisory to all mosques and Muslim community centers across the nation to secure their facilities against possible threats of attack and vandalism. The advisory comes in direct response to revealed FBI investigations this week that show evidence for possible violence against two Florida mosques and a local Islamic leader.As Robert Spencer noted back on May 14, in the wake of the Fort Dix jihad plot arrests, the mainstream media featured numerous news articles focusing on the fears of other Muslims in America:
Philadelphia's CBS3 reported: "Muslims in the region are bracing themselves for a possible backlash in response to the terror plot arrests." There was no shortage of Muslim spokesmen available to confirm these fears. "What we're all afraid of is a new backlash," said Hesham Mahmoud of the New Jersey chapter of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee. An official of the South Jersey Islamic Center, the spiritual home of several of the jihadist suspects, also expressed fears that they "are going to face a backlash." A Muslim in New Jersey, Tajwar Roomi, expressed fear for her family: "My husband works for the state. My son, my daughter, they all work. I do get worried about them because some people are nice, [but] some people are not." As far away as Iowa, the imam of Des Moines' Islamic Center, Ibrahim Dremali, said: "Some are afraid backlash may be coming. People are becoming cautious again. I've told them they have to be careful."But none of the backlash reports included news of any actual backlash incidents, because four days after the arrests, there hadn't been any.
... the attorney for one of the accused jihad plotters, Serdar Tatar, came closest to actually reporting one. Sparaco said that the restaurant owned by Tatar's father, Muslim Tatar, had suffered a sharp decline in business, and that someone kicked in his door and, according to New Jersey's Star-Ledger, "shouted a racial slur." Muslim Tatar, according to Sparaco, had also been threatened.
That was it, as far as backlash went. The contrast is stark: when cartoons of the Muslim prophet Muhammad appeared in a Danish newspaper, there were international riots, in which several innocent people were killed; when Pope Benedict XVI repeated a medieval emperor's negative characterization of Muhammad, there were again riots and killings. When a mentally impaired Christian in Nigeria tore a copy of the Qur'an, rampaging Muslims burned ten churches to the ground. But when six Muslims in America were arrested for plotting to kill as many American soldiers as possible, there have been no killings. No mob action. No riots. No mosques have been torched, and no Muslims have been beaten or (with the possible lone exception of Muslim Tatar) harassed.
Of this Americans can justly be proud. The paucity of backlash incidents after the Fort Dix arrests and other jihad terror arrests -- as well as after 9/11 -- shows that Americans are still essentially decent people who generally do not victimize people on the basis of their identity or associations. Yet statistics cited by the Des Moines Register painted a very different picture: "a nationwide survey by the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations...counted 1,972 incidents of anti-Muslim bias in 2005, up from 1,522 in 2004. The 2005 figure, from the group's most recent tally, represents the largest number reported to the council, also known as CAIR, in its 12-year history."As Spencer also notes in his article, it's worthwhile in light of the facts to step back and consider some of the media reports we are not seeing.So are Muslims really facing an increasing climate of hostility and harassment in the United States? Unlikely. Daniel Pipes and Sharon Chadha studied an earlier CAIR hate crimes report in 2005 and discovered that "of twenty 'anti-Muslim hate crimes' in 2004 that CAIR describes, at least six are invalid." These included one incident of a bombing outside a mosque for which no police report exists, and which seems not to have taken place at all; one of an arson attack against a mosque that police had determined was a simple robbery, with no "hate" motive; and two incidents of Muslim store owners destroying their own stores.
Why would CAIR trump up hate crimes? Because victimhood is big business.
Amid the steady stream of backlash articles, there has not been even one article about Muslims pledging to redouble their efforts to teach against the jihad ideology in American mosques. While many have reaffirmed that Islam is a religion of peace and scolded authorities for linking Islam with militancy, no Muslims have explained how this peaceful religion keeps being so outrageously misunderstood by those who are often its most devout adherents, or what they propose to do to keep this from happening in the future. No reporters -- consumed as they are with their search for backlash incidents -- are even asking questions like this.MSM reporters may not be asking these questions, but they need to be asked, and answers from the Muslim community need to be provided, with solutions such as speaking out against the jihadists and mosques that preach violence. They can start by identifying the mosques, what is said, and publishing it!And that makes it likely that the Fort Dix jihad plotters will not be the last Muslims in America to "misunderstand" their religion and think it enjoins them to commit acts of violence against unbelievers.
I'm waiting with baited breath.
BTW, my Muslim friends tell me that they have stopped going to the main mosque in our community because the Friday prayers has become CAIR indoctrinations.
Remember, Islamism, not Islam is the Problem. However, although Islamism is indeed the problem, we seldom if ever hear a word from the non-Islamist Muslims, only Islamist groups like CAIR, MPAC, their leadership, and their supporters.
Posted by Abdul at May 23, 2007 11:11 AM
