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From The Mailbag

20 years

Is Islam claimstaking America?
When area residents learned that the City Planning Commission had approved a planned mosque and Islamic center with a school and a swimming pool the furor began. No, we aren't talking about the Ground Zero Mosque in New York. This mosque, one of two being built in the Nashville, Tennessee area is being built in Murfreesboro, a Nashville suburb. The furor, likely fueled in part by the furor surrounding the Ground Zero Mosque, was triggered during the political primary season when Murfreesboro's Muslim community leaders announced the building of a 52,900 square foot mosque, the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro. The backlash was immediate.

According to Saleb M. Sbenaty, an engineering professor who is overseeing the mosque's expansion, Muslims in the Murfreesboro area have never experienced this level of hostility from the non-Muslim citizens of Murfreesboro before. Not even on Sept. 11, 2001. Shortly after the World Trade Center disaster Sbenaty—a Syrian Muslim—said he and his wife, who was wearing a hijab, were in the parking lot of a shopping center in Murfreesboro when they were approached by a small group of local residents who assured them that they had nothing to fear from Murfreeboroites who knew it was radical Muslim extremists who flew two 757s into the twin towers of the World Trade Center, another into the Pentagon and the fourth that crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania in Stonycreek Township. Nearly three thousand Americans died on Sept. 11 and there were no random reprisals against Muslims (although the Council on American-Islamic Relations [CAIR] claims more than 1,700 attacks on American Muslims by Christian Americans took place from Sept. 11, 2001 through Feb. 2002 including 289 acts of physical violence and 166 reported cases of discrimination in the workplace).

In Murfreesboro, when the local Muslim community which had been holding worship in makeshift worship space—a one bedroom apartment and an office behind a Lube Express—for 30 years decided to construct a 52,900 square foot mosque on a $320 thousand piece of land for which they had no money to build, they lit a fuse that exploded during the primary election. To raise the money they needed to pay off the land and build their mosque, the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro launched a nationwide fundraising appeal...just like the Ground Zero Mosque—which, of course, means the Saudi royal family or some other Mideast Muslim "charity" is likely paying for the mosque in Murfreesboro since the Islamic Center in Murfreesboro "raised" $600 thousand from their appeal.

As the furor over the Ground Zero Mosque in New York intensified, the local Murfreesboro politicians running for their parties nominations for office used the debate, pro or con, in their talking points on the campaign trail as anti-Muslim sentiment began to grow—not only in Murfreesboro and Nashville, but all over the country. A Time Magazine poll taken on Aug. 26, 2010 revealed that 43% of Americans now have an unfavorable view of Muslims. (The percentage is probably much higher, but since it is politically incorrect to hate, dislike or mistrust a racial or ethnic minority, the majority of those surveyed likely kept their honest opinions to themselves.) Americans understand the Ground Zero Mosque is, in the view of the Muslims around the world, far more than a mosque and a community center. In the Islamic world, when Muslims defeat a nation, they build a mosque on the ashes of the defeated enemy's most revered spot. In our case, that revered spot was the nation's financial hub in lower Manhattan: the World Trade Center, since the "god" of the financiers is money.

Yet, as the Islamic world busied itself claimstaking America, the Christian population in Murfreesboro added 2 + 2 and discovered the answer was still four. Building a $360 thousand mosque in the quiet Nashville suburb of Murfreesboro for 250 Muslim families was, in their mind, the expansion of the Islamic victory mosque in New York City. While proponents of the Murfreesboro mosque argue that mosque opponents are displaying religious intolerance by protesting the construction of the mosque, Christians in Murfreesboro raised concerns about Islamic radicalism in their city. When Murfreesboroites protested the mosque with a completely nonviolent march, CNN covered it. One marcher told CNN affiliate WTVF, "In Islam, a mosque means we have conquered this country. And where are they? They're in the center of Tennessee. They're going to say, we've conquered Tennessee."

Murfreesboro corrections officer Kevin Fisher, a Republican running for the school board, who led the protest march against the mosque, said that those opposed to the mosque intend "...to contend every brick that's laid." Fisher, a Black American who said he has experienced racial intolerance in his life, added that "...This has nothing to do with racism or racial intolerance at all. It's about a difference of opinion. In America, that's okay. Religion. Race. These are just code words used to distract from the real issues. If Home Depot was burying bodies in the water supply I would be equally concerned." The reference to burying a body in the water supply stemmed from the Islamic Center burying a body on their recently purchased property "...without a casket or proper embalming." In point of fact, according to Doug Demosi, the Rutherford County Regional Planning Commission Director, said the Islamic Center applied for permission and, since religious organizations are exempt from some rules, and, Demosi added, it doesn't appear any State regulations were violated. Demosi also said the center does not have approval for any other burials and the Planning Commission said it does not intend to allow a cemetery on the grounds.

Liberal members of the feminist socialist Middle Tennesseans for Religious Freedom that supports religious freedom for everyone except Christians (like the liberals in New York) claim that what is happening in Murfreesboro was, plain and simple, pure Islamophobia. Social progressives like Jewish New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg believe those protesting the Cordoba House Mosque are Islamophobes.

Hopefully New Yorkers understand that the Cordoba House Mosque is monument to what Islam views as their victory against the Great Satan in New York on Sept. 11, 2001. On Aug. 24, a defiant Mayor Bloomberg insisted that the mosque must be built near Ground Zero, declaring "...we must do what is right, not what is easy. And we must put our faith in the freedoms that have sustained our great country for more than 200 years." He made that statement at a Ramadan dinner at Gracie Mansion, adding there can be no middle ground when it comes to religious liberty."

Bloomberg insisted that building the mosque was the best way to fight terrorism. Bloomberg is wrong. His decision and the use of his office to let the Cordoba House Initiative erect a monument to Islam's "victory" in destroying the Great American Satan has angered not only New Yorkers but Americans all over the United States. And, it has nothing to do with Islamophobia. It has to do with common sense, patriotism and national pride. Hopefully the people of New York will end 3rd term mayor Bloomberg's political career not only as mayor but any elective office in the United States. Bloomberg's $17 billion fortune will not help him get elected if the people of New York simply refuse to cast their vote for him. Just because you're rich does not entitle you to office. Those who "serve" the people should be willing to do just that—serve, not rule. The American people got rid of rulers during the Revolutionary War.

If Bloomberg wants to hold political office after selling out the American people, perhaps he should move to Riyadh, Tehran or Baghdad. Bloomberg would like to be the governor of New York. New Yorkers need to make sure that never happens.

If you spend any time watching the Muslim community across the United States, you will be a first hand witness the attempt of the Islamic world to Islamize the United States with the help of social progressive politicians who [a] believe that one religion is no different than the next, and that any religion works since, in their view, there is no God anyway; and [b] made a pact with the Muslim world to keep Muslim oil flowing to the United States and, in violation of the Constitution, to create a national religion based on Shari'a law.

If we had been paying attention over the last few years we, as a nation, would have witnessed the attempt of the Muslim world to Islamize America city-by-city, county-by-county, mosque-by-mosque. In Nashville, two other mosques were initially funded. One was abandoned, the other was built. At the end of the first Iraq war under Bush-41 Nashville had become the "gateway city" for Muslim refuges from Iraq and Kuwait emigrating to the United States. Two decades later Nashville and its surrounding bedroom communities had become an oasis for Muslims. The Memphis Commercial Appeal reported in a 2008 article that Greater Memphis was the home of an estimated 10 to 15 thousand Islamics. The Memphis Islamic Center raised $800 thousand to buy the land their mosque sits on and another $3.65 million to build the mosque. But regardless of claimed membership that theoretically funded the financing of the mosques in Murfreesboro, Nashville and Memphis, the government of Saudi Arabia began financing the construction of mosques and Islamic schools in several countries.

The Saudi newspaper Ain al-Yaqeen reported that the Saudis have financed the construction of up to 2,000 mosques around the world. Currently there are 1,510 Islamic Centers or mosques in the United States, with several more in the planning or construction phase.

Among the mosques financed by King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia are the Masjid Ibrahim Mosque in Kingman, Arizona, the Darul Islah Mosque in Teaneck, New Jersey, the King Fahd Mosque, built in 1998 in Culver City, California and the Islamic Cultural Center in Rome, Italy. The Culver City Mosque cost the Saudi government $8 million. The mosque in Rome? Fifty million. When you're competing with the Vatican, $8 million won't cut it. Eighty percent of the mosques in the United States have been build since 1980. Interestingly, 25% of the mosque attendees in the United States earn less than $20 thousand. 93% of the mosques in the United States provide cash stipends to the poor families in their congregations. In other words, in the United States, the Muslims buy converts. Mosque attendance has increased by 75% since 1975. Twenty-nine percent of those who attend the mosques in the United States are converts to Islam. The majority of these converts are racial minorities.