MORE PROOF THAT THE ANTI-JUDEO/CHRISTIAN LEFT IS PRO-ISLAM

WEEKLY STANDARD (hat tip POWERLINE):

ON NOVEMBER 7, 2002, POLITICIANS AND OTHER LUMINARIES--including Boston Mayor Thomas P. Menino--gathered at the corner of Tremont Street and Malcolm X Boulevard in Boston's Roxbury neighborhood. They held shovels and awaited a photo op to celebrate the ground-breaking of a new mosque for the Islamic Society of Boston (ISB). It was a special occasion. The design for the $22 million mosque included a125-foot minaret as well as a 75-foot dome over the prayer hall. Al Jazeera joined the local Boston media on hand to chronicle the day.

It must have seemed noble and high-minded to offer such public support for the construction of a prominent mosque, especially since it had been only a little over a year since the 9/11 attacks. Senator John Kerry, who couldn't attend the event, sent a letter "recogniz[ing] the outstanding work of the Islamic Society of Boston" and praising the project for coming along at a time "when the need for cross-cultural understanding and cooperation has never been greater."

But the good feelings didn't last. In the following months, the Boston Herald and Boston's Fox Channel 25 published reports documenting the ISB's ties with terrorists, terror supporters, and anti-Semites. [...] Mayor Menino is normally adamant about the separation of church and state. As Boston Globe columnist Jeff Jacoby recently noted, Menino is the kind of fellow who, in column, wrote "about the lighting of Christmas Trees all over Boston--yet not once [did] he use the word 'Christmas' to modify the word 'tree.'" It also seemed strange that the city would extend an apparent financial handout to an organization capable of raising the cash to complete a $22 million construction project.

And there was another oddity about the conveyance. According to Boston City Councilor Jerry McDermott, to get the signatures of the ISB trustees, the paper work had to be sent to Saudi Arabia.

THE LAND TRANSFER AND THE POSSIBLE government subsidy that accompanied it focused media attention on the Islamic Society of Boston. Although the ISB widely and often claims to champion a "path of moderation, free of extremism" and "condemns all forms of bigotry," it has had relationships with some unsavory figures. For example, one of the Society's founders, Abdurahman Alamoudi, has been languishing in a federal prison for the past 18 months because of his ties to terrorism; his sentence calls for him to remain under government supervision for the next three decades. United States Attorney Paul McNulty called Alamoudi's conviction a "milestone in the war on terrorism." [...]

... Boston resident James Policastro against the BRA and the City of Boston, [initiated a suit against the city of Boston] it alleges that the city provided an unconstitutional subsidy to the ISB by conveying the land for the mosque at a price below market value. What may make the Policastro suit incendiary is that the discovery process could uncover what went into the BRA's land grant to the ISB.

According to Evan Slavitt, Policastro's attorney, "any government subsidy to a religion is an implicit violation of the establishment clause." Because part of the purchase "price" for the land was a lecture series (along with other difficult-to-quantify considerations), the city may have trouble refuting the notion that the conveyance was unconstitutional.

But the city might face a bigger embarrassment still. Again, according to Slavitt, the details of how the city signed off on the deal with the ISB are unclear. These details will likely see the light of day thanks to the Policastro suit.

For this story, repeated inquiries were made to both the mayor's office and the BRA, asking (1) whether or not the BRA and/or the mayor's office were aware of the connections between the ISB and Abdurahman Alamoudi, Walid Fitaihi, and Yusaf al-Qaradawi; and (2) what due diligence went into qualifying the ISB before the land was conveyed to the organization.

[THESE ARE EXCERPTS from a MUST RTWT article by Dean Barnett, who also writes about politics and other matters at soxblog.com.]

Leftie polticians who help organizations like the ACLU try to banish Judeo-Chritian religion from our schools and courts and money and public squares AID AND ABET THE ESTABLISHEMT OF ISLAM. WHY?! Because they are post-modernt Leftist who hate the West, they are not anti-religion any religion which is anti-West. hence their support for Islam, and "love affair" with the Dalai Lama and Hinduism and witch-craft/paganism etc.