WHAT THE MINNESOTA IMAMS WERE REALLY UP TO

Nobody really thinks those Imam-provocateurs in Minneapolis were simply engaging in the nervous pre-flight prayers that are probably common to many airline passengers, particularly since September 11th. But the idea that they were merely trying to cause a ruckus and garner publicity for the claim that Muslims are being unfairly targeted is also, I think, incorrect.

Today the Washington Times described what they actually did:

Muslim religious leaders removed from a Minneapolis flight last week exhibited behavior associated with a security probe by terrorists and were not merely engaged in prayers, according to witnesses, police reports and aviation security officials.

Specifically:

Passengers and flight attendants told law-enforcement officials the imams switched from their assigned seats to a pattern associated with the September 11 terrorist attacks and also found in probes of U.S. security since the attacks -- two in the front row first-class, two in the middle of the plane on the exit aisle and two in the rear of the cabin. "That would alarm me," said a federal air marshal who asked to remain anonymous. "They now control all of the entry and exit routes to the plane." A pilot from another airline said: "That behavior has been identified as a terrorist probe in the airline industry."

By engaging in patterns of behavior which they evidently knew were considered by airlines and federal air marshals to indicate an imminent terrorist operation, the imams were inviting their removal from the flight. Their purpose in then claiming discrimination is to make it impossible, or at least much more difficult, for the airlines to remove Muslim passengers who do the things that terrorists are expected to do.

In other words, the imams took an action calculated to make it more difficult for the airlines and the TSA to prevent another terrorist attack on American airliners.

One of the six imams, Omar Shahin, has publicly stated his "opinion" that Muslims did not commit the September 11th atrocities, and admitted that he had ties to Usama Bin Laden. He is connected to a so-called charity that provided funds to Hamas, before the Treasury Department froze its assets.

Al Qaeda and its ilk still desire to commit another mass-murder atrocity involving American airliners. These six imams were helping to lay the groundwork for that attack. They should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.