Rev.Terry Jones is at it again, and so is the media.
Infamous for burning a Qur'an, Jones has planned a protest outside the Islamic Center of America in Dearborn, Michigan. City officials and Dearborn police are trying to stop him, in the interest of "preventing riots" and protecting their city. They are insisting that if Jones protests, he should cough up $46,000 to pay for security costs, or better yet, take his protest to the steps of City Hall or the civic center. In a media-published letter, Dearborn mayor John B. O'Reilly puzzled over the logic of protesting Sharia law in Dearborn, argued that Jones will incommode Good Friday services at nearby churches, and accused Jones of disregarding the Constitution.
(note: the ACLU is defending Jones' right to protest...even Dearborn lawyer Majed Moughni thinks Jones should be allowed to protest...even though last year, Moughni was burning Jones in effigy for desecrating the Qur'an)
It's a complicated situation. Rev. Jones is a non-desirable for many reasons:
1) he's got a $1.2 million dollar bounty on his head, compliments of a Pakistani-based terrorist group.
2) he receives a steady stream of death threats, and would therefore be hard to protect
3) he obnoxiously exercises his 2nd Amendment rights
4) he has a hideous mustache
5) he is outspokenly bashing The Religion of Peace in an area home to the largest concentration of ethnic Arabs outside of the Middle East; approximately 150,000 Muslims live in the Detroit/Dearborn area.
It's not hard to imagine a protest in Dearborn turning ugly. After all, the Islamic Center of America is located at 19500 Ford Rd, six miles from the intersection of Miller Road and Michigan Avenue. You probably don't remember, but in October of 2009, the FBI murdered a 53 year old imam named Luqman Ameen Abdullah.
Or at least, that's what the Islamic community believes.
If you read the FBI report, Abdullah (aka Christopher Thomas) was being arrested on a raft of federal charges including conspiracy (blow up SuperBowl XL), receipt of stolen goods, and firearms offenses. In a warehouse in Dearborn, he pulled a gun on agents, fired shots, and killed an FBI dog before they employed the "necessary use of deadly force." Incidently, in the same raid, eleven of Abdullah's followers were arrested.
Interim U.S. Attorney Terrence Berg and Andrew Arena, FBI special agent in charge in Detroit, said Abdullah and his followers were dedicated to establishing a separate state within the United States governed by Sharia law. (uh...isn't that what Jones is concerned about?)
If you research Abdullah, you'll find that he was well-liked by leadership at the Council of American Islamic Relations, that he sometimes ran a soup-kitchen for the homeless, and that he thought all Muslims should have guns and use them to defeat the infidel government of the U.S.
FBI were undercover in Abdullah's Michigan circles for two years. It seems at his mosque, Abdullah's discipline method included beating children - on one occasion, to the point where a small boy could not walk for several days.
Is Abdullah's armed resistance to the FBI perceived as martyrdom for Islam in Dearborn? He died six miles from where Jones is set to protest - does that have anything to do with the current situation with Rev. Terry Jones? Are police concerned with a violent riot because of the 4 churches adjacent to the Islamic Center, or because of self-described Muslims who have vocalized the wish to kill Jones? Does the fact that Dearborn McDonalds serves halal mcnuggets factor in?
I don't know, but I wish someone who is being paid as a journalist would do a little digging and find out.
Links:
Detroit News on Jone's possible arrest
ACLU of Michigan defending Jones
Compilation of news stories on Abdullah (including AP, Detroit News, and the Muslim Alliance of North America)
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