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Cleveland’s New Terror Imam
Ohio's largest mosque found an extremist replacement for its deported terror-linked leader.
When Fawaz Damra was deported in early January 2007, he left a sizable leadership void at the Islamic Center of Cleveland, the largest mosque in Ohio where he had served as imam since 1991. Damra was convicted in June 2004 for failing to disclose his ties to three terrorist organizations when he applied for U.S. citizenship and was also named an unindicted co-conspirator in Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Sami al-Arian’s terrorism trial. The pair had been captured on video tape raising funds for the terrorist organization and recorded on FBI wiretaps discussing raising funds for the families of suicide bombers. Damra had also been caught lecturing his congregation on how Jews were “the sons of monkeys and apes.”
Prior to coming to Cleveland, Damra was one of the three founders of the al-Kifah Refugee Center, the U.S. recruiting office for the Maktab al-Khidamat, a bin Laden-financed precursor to al-Qaeda. He also served as the imam of the al-Farouq mosque in Brooklyn that served as the hub of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing plot and the home of now-convicted “blind sheikh” Omar Abdel-Rahman.
Since Damra’s forced departure, two potential successors have rapidly come and gone. The first intended successor, Mohamad Altabaa, who was hired from another area mosque, was quickly given the heave-ho for being too moderate. Now, however, the Cleveland mosque has settled on a permanent replacement, Egyptian cleric Sayed Ahmed Abouabdalla, who seems qualified to pick up where Damra left off.
Just weeks into his new position, Abouabdalla is already being hailed as a great interfaith leader by the Cleveland Plain Dealer, even though by its own admission Abouabdalla barely speaks English (a translator was needed for his interview with Plain Dealer reporter David Briggs) and has a short track record as a religious leader in the U.S. (his most recent position was as part-time imam for the Islamic Cultural Institute in St. Clair Shores, Michigan).
But considering what happened with Abouabdalla’s most immediate predecessor, Ahmad Alzaree, last October (more on that episode below) you might think that the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the rest of the media would be more cautious, or at least more diligent in researching the background of its newfound interfaith paragon, who, it should be noted, is replacing its old interfaith paragon, Fawaz “Jews are sons of monkeys and apes” Damra.
In fact, there is much in Abouabdalla’s résumé that ought to give his media cheerleaders considerable pause.
One element in the Plain Dealer’s recent coverage of Abouabdalla’s background that passes without the slightest bit of apparent investigation is the fact that he continues to serve as a faculty member of the Islamic American University (IAU) in Dearborn, Michigan. Of the 19 courses offered by IAU this summer term, Abouabdalla teaches 14 of them.
IAU is a project of the Muslim American Society (MAS), an organization federal prosecutors just recently identified in a federal appeals court brief as being “founded as the overt arm of the Muslim Brotherhood in the United States.” The Muslim Brotherhood has been the breeding ground for virtually every single Islamic terrorist group in the world, and the vast majority of al-Qaeda’s leadership has come through its ranks.
The MAS/Muslim Brotherhood association is just the beginning of IAU’s ties to terror. The honorary chairman of the IAU board of trustees is none other than Hamas spiritual leader Yousef al-Qaradawi — a fact acknowledged on the MAS website — who has been banned from the U.S. since 1999 for his open support of terrorist activities.
Not only has Qaradawi repeatedly issued fatwas defending the use of suicide bombings, but in August 2004 he co-signed a letter with the leaders of both Hezbollah and Hamas calling for al-Qaeda-backed insurgents in Iraq to “purify the land of Islam from the filth of occupation,” meaning U.S. military forces. He has said that “those who die fighting U.S. occupation forces are martyrs,” and he also recently defended the use of women as suicide bombers. Rightly so, the Anti-Defamation League has described Qaradawi as the “theologian of terror.”
Abouabdalla has also served on the Fiqh Council of North America as recently as last summer — an association that the Plain Dealer makes absolutely no mention of. For good reason, it seems, as the Fiqh Council is a “Who’s Who” of convicted terrorist leaders, terrorist fundraisers, unindicted co-conspirators, and terrorist associates. One former member, Abdurahman Alamoudi, is serving a 23-year prison sentence on terrorism charges for working with Libyan intelligence to assassinate the Saudi crown prince.
The Fiqh Council issued a fatwa in 2005 that was much ballyhooed by the media for allegedly denouncing terrorism, though it never defined terrorism or condemned any terrorist group by name. And as I have reported elsewhere, notwithstanding their own terrorism fatwa forbidding any association with terrorists, three members of the Fiqh Council appeared at an event in Qatar in July 2007 honoring Yousef al-Qaradawi and featuring Hamas leader Khaled Mishal — a specially designated terrorist by the U.S. government. The trio’s appearance at the event was noted on Qaradawi’s personal website. Video of the event that originally aired on al-Jazeera shows Fiqh Council member Salah Sultan sitting on the speaker dais right beside Qaradawi and Mishal.
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Patrick Poole is a regular contributor to Pajamas Media, and an anti-terrorism consultant to law enforcement and the military.
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19 Comments
1. Mary Madigan:Great investigative reporting!
I think the concept of investigative, honest, unbiased reporting is so foreign to most MSM types, they classify anyone who does it as a “blogger”
Jul 9, 2008 - 6:35 am 2. Smarty:I have just been in a job search. As an Engineer, I have ignored all Ohio job openings, and point blank told recruiters NO to Ohio; don’t even ask. All because of race relations, which you can translate to “Ohio blacks are radical and out of control, and the whites who share power with them are too PC to get them under control”.
I cannot be the only one, and I must not be, because the Ohio economy is suffering under foolish policies and a lack of talent.
Jul 9, 2008 - 8:01 am 3. Roark:I’m telling you, Ohio, Minnesota, and Michigan are going to get out of control unless the National Guard comes in an sets things right.
Jul 9, 2008 - 8:30 am 4. Shariah Law in the USA-Cleveland’s New Terror Imam « Shariah Finance Watch:[...] Posted by allysonrt on July 9, 2008 http://pajamasmedia .com/blog/ cleveland% e2%80%99s- new-terror- imam/ [...]
Jul 9, 2008 - 8:44 am 5. Ohio’s largest Mosque replaces deposed terror-linked Imam with… | Infidels Are Cool:[...] Their first replacement was fired for being “too moderate”, but now they’ve found their man to continue the [...]
Jul 9, 2008 - 9:57 am 6. olad:it,s clear Now GOP changing to be communists party and ignored rights of _religion, freedom of speach, freedome of… and etc_ in whats when is upon a time known world,s most democrotic and freedom USA.
Jul 9, 2008 - 10:47 am 7. Jude:however,I used to work in Columbus OHio after I came to USA on 27 september 2001 I met alot of hard work , religious discrimination , when day my mannager stood in front ofme where I was bowing and come b/ween my allah and me. He was White man , I did not know what to do rather than to I quit my job and i did .in columbus again with an other company they put a moving camara wher aver I was working, when ever I was praying, even if I go to the rest room .
is that what you call national guard .
guys whe need real change to safe the world from extrimist not only islamists but also poeple like Roark, and who ever thinking the same .
When you pray at work the company should deduct the time from your pay. You’re not working, your praying.
Newt is correct when he says we’ll wise up when we lose a city.
Jul 9, 2008 - 3:29 pm 8. BadBlackMan:Smarty, those bad bad African Americans from Ohio are out to GET you!! You must be extreeeemly intelligent. We’ve got enough of you geniuses out west. Pleeeese do not head this way! Thanx!!
Jul 9, 2008 - 3:50 pm 9. olad:The issue is not the prayers but using the power in his hand , stopping me to do my blessing , and humalating me in the front of every body becouse I was changing my forklift battery and get a time to do my prayers at same time. besides, there ware lot of fork lifts ahead of mine.
the guy (manager)has not any feeling and no one can justify his behavior . I was one of the working class and I new my job covering 90% of my job discription every day getting my breaks the other 10%to get my daily life .one other day in other campany the girl who changes battery tended to kill me with open covers of battery and I swallowed the battery foams ,I did not recognise untill I vomatted and my eyes got red becouse i was to cver my jop on time still
I still couph what those people coused me .
I come the hazard department and reported they send me to hospital and next day she was working the same place knowing what she did to me the manager and all supperiors were there and knew what happen to me what can you justfy this irrisponseplity again she was white again !!!!!?
Jul 9, 2008 - 6:16 pm 10. ab:I wonder why one likes to thereaten the other and try to direct the hatred and call it salvation who cares the bad african american do think you do ?
Those Muslim extremists must be snickering in their mosques at the PC absurdities that render us impotent in our own country. If federal law enforcement could subvert the KKK, why is it so difficult to rid ourselves of these Islamic bigots who align themselves with terrorists groups?
Jul 9, 2008 - 8:22 pm 11. p2:having no concept of OUR culture except for what is given to them through dvd’s and the movies, most moslems moving into the free west end up becoming resentful.
Jul 10, 2008 - 7:42 am 12. tanstaafl:the idea to them is that we are a great country because we all get to come here and bend the rules and fight over who gets all the tax money from the evil white racists by getting their ethnic group represented in the kleptocracy first.
I dont really blame dola if he was never informed before he arrived. career socialists OWN our immigration system and the politicians take it a complement if they create these bureaucracies.
dola what youre missing is that every one of your faith’s countries are autocracies except turkey and now iraq. we used to try and return to those places and free them after we had moved to the US (germany twice..) but now its all about being a parasite and reading the rule book back to americans. youre going to start a civil war here, but why should you care about anything. you dont have to be responsible at all, you are the victim here.s/off.
Vijay Kumar, running for the US Congress in Tennessee’s 5th District, really puts it all together.
This interview Is a MUST READ
Jul 10, 2008 - 9:30 am 13. moreland:“tanstaafl:
Vijay Kumar, running for the US Congress in Tennessee’s 5th District, really puts it all together.
This interview Is a MUST READ”
i’ll second that. go to:
http://frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=53EDA97A-4626-4866-80A2-6694936F101B
Jul 11, 2008 - 7:40 am 14. Dawn:I know we espouse freedom of religion in this country but the muslims are taking advantage. Since EVERYTHING we in the West do frigging annoys them or their nutty relgion, they should not be allowed to come here and quite frankly I don’t know why they want to be here. They are clueless about freedom and how hard we had to work for it; they stomp on it and disrespect every decent American. Why are we tolerating them?
Jul 11, 2008 - 11:29 am 15. Jude:OLAD:::
Jul 11, 2008 - 8:12 pm 16. ChrisGreen:You feel so sorry for yourself it’s sickening and you’re still mixing up your prayers with your work either do one or the other. There are procedures for changing a battery don’t give us a line of bull about getting hurt watching a women change a battery. You are a real a$$ hole if you think you are fooling us with your story. Do your job and quit acting like a damn child for crying out loud. Your blabbering is disgusting.
Olad,
Assuming you were doing your job well, your manager was a jerk and you could have taken him and/or the company to court. However, the fact that your manager is an idiot, or that fact that you didn’t sue him (and believe me, there would have been plenty of lawyers dying to take your case) is not the fault of the GOP. The same thing would have happened to you if John Kerry (a democrat) had been president.
If you want justice, TAKE IT. That is what Americans do. Seek legal council and find out if your rights were violated, then send the SOB do jail if your rights were clearly violated. You have that right because you live in America.
Jul 15, 2008 - 12:54 pm 17. ChrisGreen:For those of you reacting to Obad’s post with angry, personal attacks, how in the world do you know he’s lying. You don’t. Not every person in this country is a saint that the fact that Obad’s manager was probably a jerk doesn’t mean this country sucks. Stop being so emotional about it and respond to his post with rational, mature arguments.
Jul 15, 2008 - 1:08 pm 18. Thorum:Is no one aware that the stated goal of Islam is to restore the Caliphate? This creeping Islamizing of the West is met with political correctness which only allows it to continue. Yes, this Imam will spout the usual vitriol against any and all who are not Muslim. So simple, no?
Jul 16, 2008 - 9:40 am 19. Dave.:olad,
Jul 17, 2008 - 11:35 amWhat you need to recognize is that behind our liberty, freedom, and whatever makes America attractive to you is the responsibility to consider others interests as equal to your own, their right to worship Yahweh or Jesus Christ as you worship Allah and Mohammad his prophet. First above “God being love” is that He is holy, sovereign, omnipotent, omniscience, and “the Way, the Truth, and the Life, no one comes to the Father but by the Son. For this reason, the Christian is required to always tell the truth and to stand for Christian doctrine. You do indeed, because this country is based on law instead of people, have the right to file for your rights as an employee/citizen. Because God is no respecter of persons, anyone should have the merits of their case determined on the facts, not the color of their skin, their religious affiliation, their sex, etc. If and when you, Olad, find Islamic law (Sharia) the governing law of this country, I doubt you will “enjoy” these benefits – they came about because our country was founded by and large by Christians and not Muslims.
Dave.