Toledo: No to Marines, Yes to Muslim Brotherhood

Here’s another one of those fun coincidences we all enjoy.

Toledo, our neighbor to the south, just made news a couple weeks ago for its mayor’s blockheaded refusal to allow U.S. Marines their previously planned and approved urban training operation in a small portion of downtown Toledo, (which, by the way, is already deserted on weekends), because the Marines “frighten people.” (“Democratic Mayors: Semper Foolish?”).

Then we learn from Patrick Poole at Central Ohioans Against Terror that the Muslim Brotherhood--who really should frighten people, in our opinion--just held a conference at the University of Toledo. (“The Muslim Brotherhood's "Grand Jihad" in Toledo”).

Maybe the Inkhwan were the people Mayor Finkbeiner was concerned would have been frightened by the U.S. Marines--if they'd been allowed into town. Poole writes:

It might only be the shores of Lake Erie, but the Muslim Brotherhood has established an invasion beachhead in Toledo. The most recent landing by the international Islamic extremist organization was last weekend when the Muslim American Society (MAS) – the ideological arm of the Muslim Brotherhood in the US, identified as such by the Department of Justice in a court filing back in December – held a conference at the University of Toledo. Perhaps it’s no coincidence that the Department of Homeland Security recently added Toledo to the list of high-risk terrorism areas.

Among the speakers were national MAS leaders Esam Omeish and Mahdi Bray, respectively the MAS president and head of their Virginia Commission on Immigration just weeks after his appointment. According to a September 28, 2007 article in the Washington Post, Omeish was forced out when a video surfaced of Omeish preaching holy war against Israel at a December 22, 2000 Jerusalem Day rally in Washington DC, where he said:

“...you have learned the way, that you have known that the jihad way is the way to liberate your land...and we shall do everything we can to help your cause.”

Here’s the video with Omeish’s remarks (the full speech video is here; all videos courtesy of the Investigative Project)

Please read the rest of this article here.

Nor did the Toledo conference lack a local connection, as our own Dawud Walid was there, making some thoughtful remarks about blacks and Islam on behalf of CAIR. He was reported by the Toledo Blade to have said:

the history lesson about how Islam spread among blacks is tied to the "slavery psyche."

Dehumanization and discrimination had a negative impact on the black psyche, he said. Some blacks joined the Muslim movement as a protest of white supremacy in America, Mr. Walid said, and some joined in an effort to carve new identities for themselves. (“Muslims’ roots in America branch out; speakers at UT event talk of positive change”).

That's as may be. But by my logic, Dawud is staying that blacks in America who embraced Islam do so in reaction to having been beaten down and dehumanized by slavery and discrimination--in other words, the "slavery psyche" lends itself to Islam.

A statement with which, come to think of it, I completely agree.