Cleveland’s New Terror Imam

Sayed Abouabdalla (right), the new imam of the Islamic Center of Cleveland and current Islamic American University instructor, with IAU chairman and HAMAS spiritual leader (and designated terrorist), Yousef Al-Qaradawi (left)
In my Pajamas Media article yesterday, “Cleveland’s New Terror Imam”, I introduce the new imam of the Islamic Center of Cleveland, Sayed Abouabdalla, the third such successor since Fawaz Damra was deported in January 2007 after being convicted of lying about his association with three terrorist groups on his US citizenship application. Abouabdalla’s most immediate predecessor was Ahmad Alzaree, who resigned his position three days before he was scheduled to start (an issue I recount in my article). Abouabdalla’s hiring fills a long leadership vacuum for Ohio’s largest Islamic mosque.

But considering the kid glove treatment that Abouabdalla has thus far received from the Cleveland Plain Dealer, I discuss some of his troubling connections to international Islamic terrorism that they have quite clearly missed:

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 pigs 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. Another former Fiqh Council member? Fawaz Damra.

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.

Now all of this information concerning IAU and the Fiqh Council would have been easily accessible for any reporter going through the motions of journalism. If the two glowing Cleveland Plain Dealer articles welcoming Abouabdalla to the area in recent weeks are any indication, however, none of that background investigation was ever done.

[more]

I also review the Cleveland Plain Dealer’s colossal blowing of the Ahmad Alzaree story last October. I observe in conclusion that the contrast between the PD’s coverage of the Fawaz Damra scandal and the kid glove treatment given to both Ahmad Alzaree, and now Sayed Abouabdalla, couldn’t be more stark.

Top Ten Central Ohio Terrorism-Related Stories of 2007

Now safely into the new year, we here at Central Ohioans Against Terrorism would like to take a few minutes to reflect on the major terrorism-related Central Ohio news stories here in 2007. Needless to say, it was an eventful year. Let’s hope that 2008 is equally as interesting.

1. Nuradin Abdi guilty plea in shopping mall terror plot
   
   
   After years of heated denials and conspiracy theories, the extremists in the Muslim community were shocked in late July when Nuradin Abdi, arrested as part of the Columbus Al-Qaeda cell run out of Masjid Omar Ibn El-Khattab just north of campus, agreed to a plea deal rather than go to trial on multiple charges of terrorism support, including a plot to shoot up a Columbus-area shopping mall. Local CAIR officials, including national vice chair Ahmad Al-Akhras and Ohio chapter president Asma Mobin-Uddin, had made a series of bizarre claims, including that Abdi had been tortured and was being drugged by federal authorities. A federal appeals court quickly rejected their conspiracy theories, concluding that Abdi was putting on an act (in accordance with stated Al-Qaeda incarceration guidelines). Abdi was sentenced to 10 years in prison on a charge of material support for terrorism in November. And as Dirk Thompson of 610 WTVN reported, Abdi’s attorney went on an anti-American rant in front of the local media following the announcement of the plea deal.
   
   Related Nuradin Abdi COAT posts.



2. Christopher Paul arrested as part of Columbus Al-Qaeda cell
   
   
   In April, Worthington-raised Christopher Paul (nee-Paul Kenyatta Laws, aka Abdulmalek Kenyatta) was arrested after a federal indictment was unsealed charging Paul with plotting to attack American tourists overseas. Paul is a 1983 graduate of Worthington High School. Following his arrest, CAIR officials became confused, as Adnan Mirza tried to distance the Muslim community from Paul, while Ahmad Al-Akhras came out in his defense, claiming that Paul was a “loving husband” and led a “good family”. (see, “Columbus Al-Qaeda Man Charged, CAIR Not Pleased”)




3. Hilliard HAMAS cleric Salah Sultan appears at Middle East terror confab
   
   
   Salah Sultan (right) sitting on the speaker dais with Specially Designated Global Terrorists Khaled Mishal (left) and Yousef Al-Qaradawi (middle)
   
   
   Salah Sultan speaking at the terror confab in Qatar
   Notwithstanding having been defended by the Columbus Dispatch and a number of area Islamic leaders as a “moderate”, Salah Sultan showed his true colors this past summer when he appeared at a conference honoring HAMAS spiritual leader Yousef Al-Qaradawi in Doha, Qatar. Sultan delivered a tearful speech praising his mentor and also produced a paper on Qaradawi’s “scientific thought” (both being published on Qaradawi’s personal website). Sultan was even photographed with Qaradawi, and he could be seen in the Al-Jazeera live coverage of the event during the speech by HAMAS head Khaled Mishal. Both Qaradawi and Mishal have been listed by the US government as Specially Designated Global Terrorists. Also in July, Sultan was identified by name in a LA Times article as one of two clerics preaching holy war and “sharing the outlook of Al-Qaeda” in Bahrain.
   
   Related Salah Sultan COAT posts.
   
   Related FrontPage Magazine articles:
   
   Hometown Jihad (04/03/2006)
   Hometown Jihad: Blowback (05/24/06)
   Hometown Jihad: Our Newest Citizen? (09/08/06)
   Hometown Jihad: The Return of Salah Sultan (03/29/07)
   Hometown Jihad: The HAMAS Connection (05/11/2007)



4. October-terror-fest at the Ohio Statehouse
   
   
   The Interfaith Association of Central Ohio sponsored an event, “The Many Voices of Islam”, in the Ohio Statehouse atrium in October featuring two known HAMAS operatives, Anisa Abd El Fattah and Robert “Farooq” Crane, and one official for the now-closed Toledo Kindhearts terror fundraising “charity”, Zulfiqar Shah, who as Southeast Asia director for the group partnered with the Al-Khidmat Foundation in Pakistan, founded by Osama bin Laden mentor and Al-Qaeda founder Abdullah Azzam. The event was organized by local extremist Abukar Arman, and was also sponsored with a $1,000 grant from the Ohio Humanities Council, a taxpayer-funded organization.




5. Cleveland imam quits before he starts
   
   
   Instead of just reporting the news, COAT became part of the news when blogger Tom Blumer of Bizzyblog reported back in September that the newly-hired imam for the Islamic Center of Cleveland, Ahmed Alzaree, had preached some virulently anti-Jewish sermons in his previous post in Omaha, Nebraska. We then followed up with additional information noting other troubling aspects to Alzaree’s preaching and breaking news of his terrorist ties (and the establishment media’s ignoring of such). Even after multiple articles by the Cleveland Plain Dealer came out defending the imam, who was scheduled to begin his new job in early November, two days before he was scheduled to start, he announced that he was quiting. According to the Plain Dealer, one of the reasons cited by Alzaree for throwing in the towel was our COAT post, “Cleveland’s new imam: interfaith “moderate” or two-faced jihadist?”. Alzaree was brought in to replace deported former imam Fawaz Damra (see below in “Honorable Mention”).




6. Abukar Arman tossed from Franklin County Homeland Security oversight committee
   
   
   A front-page article in the Columbus Dispatch and a coordinated political cover-up by City Hall and the Franklin County Commission (more on the cover-up) weren’t enough to save Abukar Arman’s position with the county Criminal Justice Planning Board, which oversees Franklin County Homeland Security. After my FrontPage expose discussing Arman’s vocal support for terrorism in a series of published articles, Arman was forced to resign from the board, in addition to losing his full-time job with the Columbus Public Schools. County Commission officials withheld information related to the Arman investigation from Dirk Thompson of 610 WTVN and myself, while simultaneously providing the exact same information to Dispatch reporter Barbara Carmen. Only after the Dispatch article appeared did the Commission release the requested information.
   
   Related Abukar Arman COAT posts.




7. Hilliard HAMAS cleric Salah Sultan denied US citizenship, flees the US for Bahrain
   
   
   As noted above (item #3), Hilliard-based HAMAS cleric Salah Sultan appeared at a terrorist confab in Qatar in July. But perhaps the most important reason for Sultan’s unashamed open association with designated terrorists in July is that earlier in the year he had been denied US citizenship based on his previous known terrorist associations and had fled the country. Once informed about the rejection, Sultan picked up most of his family and moved to Bahrain. But even his arrival there was met with controversy, as Bahraini politicians complained in May that Sultan and his buddy Wagdi Ghoneim had received almost instantaneous citizenship there (as reported by Al-Wasat). The Bahraini press noted Sultan’s hasty departure and the denial of his US citizenship. Even Bahraini bloggers have been critical of Sultan and his jihadist crew.




8. HAMAS operative Anisa Abd El Fattah/Caroline Keeble interviewed for open Columbus Public School Board spot
   
   
   Anisa Abd El Fattah on the left; Caroline Keeble on the right. Two different versions of the same person.
   During the investigation into Fattah’s appearance at the October-terror-fest at the Ohio Statehouse, I noticed that Fattah’s non-jihad persona, Caroline Keeble, had been interviewed by the Columbus Public School Board last January for an open position on school board. The results of my investigation were published in a PJM article, “HAMAS: Coming to a School Board near you”. The resume she had submitted as part of her application (obtained with great difficulty from the school district despite an Open Records Act request) made no mention of the HAMAS front organizations she had worked for during the 1990s and earlier this decade, nor her longtime consulting position with now convicted terrorist leader Abdurahman Alamoudi or her founding board member position with the national Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). Though one of the few candidates to receive an interview by the school board, she did not get appointed to either of the two open seats she applied for.




9. Muslim Brotherhood leader identified in Central Ohio
   
   
   I haven’t done much follow-up reporting on this issue since my original post, but one bombshell piece of evidence that came out of the Holy Land Foundation terrorism financing trial in Dallas this past summer was a phonebook of Muslim Brotherhood leaders in North America. One entry in this Muslim Brotherhood leadership directory was an individual, Hany Saker, located in Columbus and identified as such by the readily identifiable 614 area code. As I reported back then, the office phone number listed for Saker was an Ohio State University number. Elsewhere in the phone directory Saker is listed as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood Board of Directors, and also the Eastern regional leader in North America. We hope to have more reporting on this story in 2008.




10. Hate Sheikh Siraj Wahhaj appears at Columbus fundraiser for Islamic group headed by mayoral advisor
    
    
    Hate sheikh Siraj Wahhaj (left) and his longtime buddy and Mayor Coleman advisor Ahmad Al-Akhras (right)
    
    When the Islamic Foundation of Central Ohio needed a keynote speaker for their annual fundraiser, its president Ahmad Al-Akhras turned to his old friend and prominent hate sheikh Siraj Wahhaj for help. Wahhaj was named by US Attorney Mary Jo White as an un-indicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Wahhaj had appeared at a March 2006 fundraiser for Sunrise Academy in Hilliard to raise money for their new gym, in June 2006 for the CAIR-Ohio annual banquet, and again in February 2007 at Sunrise Academy for yet another fundraiser for Masjid Abubakar Al Siddique. Among many other things, Wahhaj says that he isn’t sure that Osama bin Laden is responsible for 9/11; he calls for the return of the global Islamic caliphate and the imposition of Islamic shari’a law, including punishment by amputations and stoning; and he calls for the violent overthrow of American government.

Honorable Mention:

Censorship State at Columbus State for Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week

(graphic courtesy of DarthDilbert)
When the Terrorism Awareness Project student group at Columbus State Community College wanted to promote their events for the national Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week in October, CSCC administrator Timeka Rashid prohibited the group from posting promotional fliers around campus and warning the student leaders not to discuss her prohibition. After I exposed Rashid’s censorship of the student events in a FrontPage Magazine article, “Censorship State”, CSCC relented and did not interfere any further in the group’s scheduled activities. As reported by Jacob Laskin in 2006, Rashid had previously prevented the same student group from hosting a screening of the documentary, Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West.

I later reported that Columbus State’s earlier censorship efforts were in response to a letter from former Congresswoman Mary Rose Oakar sent to CSCC president Valeriana Moeller asking for the school’s cooperation in obstructing events related to Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week.


Akron-born jihadist pleads guilty to terror charges, sentenced to 15 years


In April, Akron native Mahmud Faruq Brent pled guilty to supporting a terrorist organization and in late July was sentenced to 15 years in prison for attending a Lakshar-e-Taiba terrorist training camp in Pakistan. A convert to Islam, Brent had been living in Maryland driving a taxi at the time of his arrest. The case was part of the Virginia Jihad Network series of prosecutions.


Cleveland Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Fawaz Damra deported


The two faces of Fawaz Damra
The year 2007 started off right as federal officials deported Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Fawaz Damra in early January. Damra had been the longtime imam of the Islamic Center of Cleveland. He was deported for lying to authorities about his ties to the terrrorist organization, failing to disclose them on his citizenship application, and for recruiting suicide bombers to attack Israel. Damra had been hailed as an "interfaith moderate" in Cleveland, that is, until videos surfaced of him calling Jews "the sons of apes and pigs" and fundraising for jihad along with PIJ leader Sami Al-Arian. Then there was his prior tenure with a NY-based front for Al-Qaeda.

Go to the Cleveland Plain Dealer’s Fawaz Damra archive.


Jihad Julio Pino at Kent State


One of the most underreported stories of the year (one we didn’t even have a chance to get to) involves Kent State Latin American History professor Julio “Jihad” Pino, who was found earlier this year operating a now-closed jihadist forum, the “Global War” blog, which proclaimed: “Are You Prepared for Jihad? IN THE NAME OF OBL. 2007: THE YEAR OF ISLAMIC VICTORY!” University of North Carolina-Wilmington Criminology professor Mike Adams exposed Pino’s jihadist rants in an article at Townhall back in February. A series of articles by Adams ran throughout the year expanding on the story. Things at Kent State came to a head in November when the History department chairman, John Jameson, was fired by the university after he approved a paid leave for Pino to travel to the Middle East without university approval. No action has been taken by the university against Pino.

Establishment media dhimmis ignore new Cleveland imam’s terror ties

Following up on last week’s blockbuster news about Egyptian hate sheikh Ahmed Alzaree’s hiring to replace the Islamic Center of Cleveland’s convicted and deported former imam, Fawaz Damra, the coverage of this growing story (fueled entirely by the work of bloggers, especially the initial work done by Tom Blumer of the Plain Dealer’s Wide Open blog and BizzyBlog) by the establishment media has aptly demonstrated the sorry condition of the supposed Fourth Estate in Ohio.

When the Plain Dealer finally got around to covering the story on Alzaree’s anti-Jewish rants on Saturday, “Public scrutiny under way for Ahmed Alzaree, new imam of Islamic Center of Cleveland”, the title couldn’t have been more fitting as the scrutiny has been entirely from the “public” not the “establishment media”. As Tom Blumer noted in a subsequent Wide Open post this weekend, “Ahmed Alzaree Follow-up: Who WAS That Cleveland.com Blogger?”, the PD’s Robert Smith couldn’t even admit that one of the PD’s own bloggers (Blumer) had been the one that broke the story. The coverage by the Associated Press/Columbus Dispatch (“Comment on Jews by incoming imam draws criticism”) and the abbreviated clip by the Cincinnati Enquirer (“Spiritual Leader’s Sermon Scrutinized”) was even more non-descript.

What is shocking is how easily the PD’s Smith allows Islamic Center of Cleveland president Jalal Abu-Shaweesh to explain away Alzaree’s anti-Jewish rant about how rocks will cry out for Muslims to kill hiding Jews:

Abu-Shaweesh, who read the sermon, said Alzaree was relaying a well-known Hadith as he listed myriad signs of Judgment Day and was likely just being thorough.

“Just being thorough”? Did that warrant any follow-up whatsoever on Smith’s part? Apparently not, because it passes without any further comment.

But what all these Ohio establishment media outlets have failed to acknowledge is the updated info we provided here concerning Alzaree’s connections to yet another deported terror cleric Wagdi Ghoneim. Here’s what I wrote:

COAT contributor Sun Tzu informs me that just prior to being expelled from the United States, one of the preachers that Ahmed Alzaree brought to Omaha was his friend and fellow Egyptian terror cleric Wagdi Ghoneim, who one US immigration official explained was kicked out of the US because “our task is not to sit around and wait for people to blow up buildings”. According to an Islamic Center of Omaha newsletter, Ghoneim visited in August 2004. JihadWatch reminds us that Switzerland has also banned Ghoneim from their country in 2005. As Daniel Pipes has noted, Ghoneim called Jews “descendants of the apes” at a 1998 CAIR event (apparently a common theme in the Damra-Alzaree-Ghoneim “inter-faith” circles).

Blumer has conveniently reposted the December 2004 LA Times article and Associated Press article concerning Ghoneim’s expulsion from the US for immigration violations and to avoid further investigation into accusations of his terrorist ties and fundraising. But not one of these “media” outlets could utter a word of mention of Ghoneim’s appearance at Alzaree’s Omaha mosque just weeks before he was expelled from the US, even though the PD’s follow-up article mentions the Central Ohioans Against Terrorism blog entry by name (yes, I am presuming that Smith read the post, since he was writing an article on the “public scrutiny” of Alzaree’s hiring; perhaps that is asking too much).

Beginning with the original Plain Dealer story by David Briggs last Tuesday, it has been the “bloggers”, not the “journalists”, who have continued to break new developments on Alzaree’s hiring, questionable background and incendiary statements. The media establishment’s reluctance to say anything critical of Islamic extremists is hardly surprising in light of their past performance, but their willful ignorance and whistling past the graveyard has become so painfully obvious that it is getting hard to watch anymore.

Ohio’s largest mosque hires Egyptian hate sheikh to replace deported terror cleric Fawaz Damra

[Be sure to see the update with new info below! And read Tom Blumer’s take on this story this morning at Wide Open blog.]

[And welcome to everyone joining us from LGF!]

Tom Blumer, the economic genius behind BizzyBlog and a new contributor to the Cleveland Plain Dealer’s brand-spanking new Wide Open blog (along with Dave from NixGuy) made me aware of an article in Tuesday’s Plain Dealer by David Briggs, “Islamic Center hires new imam to replace deported cleric”, announcing that the Islamic Center of Cleveland, former home of Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Fawaz Damra (before the US government stripped him of his citizenship and deported him back to Israel earlier this year), has been replaced by Ahmed Alzaree, who will assume his new position as head cleric on November 1. The Associated Press has also picked up the story. Alzaree comes to the Buckeye State from Omaha, Nebraska.

Considering Damra’s high-profile expulsion from the US, you would think that the Islamic Center of Cleveland would hire a more moderate voice to lead them than the terrorist cheerleader they had most recently. Think again.

Not mentioned in the Plain Dealer‘s report is Ahmed Alzaree’s anti-Jewish rants. According to Blumer, in a 15-second Google search, he came across a particular sermon dated March 7, 2003 where Alzaree offers this encouragement to his followers:

Dear brothers and sisters, the talk about the Day of Judgment is long and full of things that will confuse the human mind and put fear in the hearts of the faithful. Every day that comes is much more Worse than the day before it as we get closer to the hour. Among the signs of the approach of Day of Judgment is what the messenger of Allah PBUH said: “The hour of judgment shall not happen until the Muslims fight the Jews. The Muslims shall kill the Jews to the point that the Jew shall hide behind a big rock or a tree and the rock or tree shall call on the Muslim saying: hey, O Muslim there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him, except the Gharqad tree which will not say, for it is the tree of Jews.” Agreed upon. This is seemed to be very soon and close now. We ask Allah SWT not to test us so hardly if we live till this horrible moment insha’allah.

Apparently, the Plain Dealer‘s David Briggs didn’t do the same Google search that Blumer performed, even though in his article Briggs states:

Alzaree would not confirm his hiring, at one point saying he would not come to Cleveland because a reporter was inquiring about his background.

Gee, what do you think a reporter might be looking into, Mr. Briggs (real quick wits among these establishment media dhimmis, eh?), and who could possibly be motivated do such an investigation (grin)?

Someone looking at Alzaree’s background (at least if they bothered to look) might also come across the following comment in that same sermon where he highlights the required Quranic “jizya” tax to be imposed upon non-Muslims and his lament at its disuse in the Muslim world:

Abou Hurairah RAA narrated that the messenger of Allah PBUH said: “By Allah it is about the time the son of Maryam comes down and he shall rule with justice and he shall break the cross and kill the pig and will remove the “Jezyah”; (i.e. the supposed tax paid to the Muslim government by non-Muslims who live with them against guarding and protecting them which is mentioned in the Holy Quran in Surat Al-Tawbah (9-29) as a “fard” or requirement in despite of being lost and no longer practiced nowadays by almost all Arab and Muslim Countries), (that means that only Islam shall be the only accepted faith and religion), and the wealth shall increase to the point the charity is not needed” Reported by Al-Bukharee and Muslim.

Now remember that what initially got Alzaree’s predecessor Damra into trouble was a videotape that came to light of him raising money for Palestinian Islamic Jihad and convicted PIJ leader Sami Al-Arian (video and transcript available from the Investigative Project). Damra was also filmed urging his supporters to point “a rifle at the first and last enemy of the Islamic nation, and that is the sons of monkeys and pigs, the Jews." This is the same Fawaz Damra that was hailed as a great inter-faith leader in Cleveland.

(Oh, and did I mention that Columbus Mayor Michael Coleman’s close advisor and CAIR national vice chairman Ahmad Al-Akhras described terror leader and fundraiser Damra as a “long-time friend”?)

Now it seems that Alzaree has been hired to bring in Damra’s harvest of hate. Ahmed Alzaree encourages his flock by bringing to mind the glorious day in the future when stones will call out for hiding Jews to be killed and laments that the practice of jizya is no longer imposed on Jews and Christians in the Muslim world as a testament of their submission to Islamic imperialism.

Real nice. A real paragon of peace the Islamic Center of Cleveland has hired in Ahmed Alzaree. A real inter-faith leader like Damra, wouldn’t you agree? If you have any doubts, just listen to Alzaree’s recent sermon, “Prejudice from a spiritual perspective”, where he will no doubt tell you all about his peace and love for his fellow members of the Abrahamic tradition and his efforts to spread the love and engage in inter-faith dialogue at Creighton University.

Just don’t hide behind any rocks in Cleveland anytime soon.

UPDATE: COAT contributor Sun Tzu informs me that just prior to being expelled from the United States, one of the preachers that Ahmed Alzaree brought to Omaha was his friend and fellow Egyptian terror cleric Wagdi Ghoneim, who one US immigration official explained was kicked out of the US because “our task is not to sit around and wait for people to blow up buildings”. According to an Islamic Center of Omaha newsletter, Ghoneim visited in August 2004. JihadWatch reminds us that Switzerland has also banned Ghoneim from their country in 2005. As Daniel Pipes has noted, Ghoneim called Jews “descendants of the apes” at a 1998 CAIR event (apparently a common theme in the Damra-Alzaree-Ghoneim “inter-faith” circles).

Regular COAT readers will recall my mentioning Ghoneim recently in connection with our own Hilliard Holy War Homeboy, Salah Sultan, who the LA Times reported in July has been hanging out in Bahrain with Ghoneim, where the two had a weekly TV program until it was shut down by the government because of its extremism. My Bahraini friend and journalist Mahmoud Al-Yousif has been keeping track of Ghoneim and Sultan’s antics there. But rest assured, the Columbus Dispatch still considers Sultan a moderate.