Recent Minnesota Christian/Islamic kerfluffles

[pegkerr]

I don't know what to think about the recent US Airway incident which took place here in Minnesota.

At first, I was outraged when I heard that six imams were arrested and taken off the plane in handcuffs. Their scary terroristic crime? Praying at the airport. And mentioning the word "Allah." For crying out loud, don't Minnesotans know by now about the Muslim practice of praying five times a day, facing Mecca?

I was even more appalled when I read a recent editorial in the Star Tribune, where a Muslim writer chided the imams for their behavior (don't have the link, sorry), scolding them for alarming nearby passengers. What kind of prejudice must Muslims face every day, I wondered, when even one of their own chides them for following the practices of their faith, for fear of what others will think?

But I read this recent article in the Washington Times, which adds more details. The imams did not take their assigned seats, but they positioned themselves near the exits, in the same configuration, the flight attendants said, of the hijackers in the September 11 attacks [were they trying to position themselves strategically? the passengers wondered.] Three of the six, who did not appear to be overweight, asked for seatbelt extenders, and then put them on the floor under their seats [handy garrottes, perhaps? the nervous wondered] The imams said that they were praying "quietly." One of the passengers, Omar Shahin, told Newsweek the group did everything it could to avoid suspicion by wearing Western clothes, speaking English and booking seats so they were not together. He said they conducted prayers quietly and separately to avoid attention.

Other witnesses described the prayers as "loud" and said they were "shouting hostile slogans about al Qaeda and the war in Iraq." Apparently one passenger who sent a concerned note to a flight attendant spoke Arabic. Katherine Kersten, our loathsome local conservative columnist, is of course all over this.

Were the imams trying to be deliberately provocative for some reason? I have absolutely no idea. I wasn't there. There do seem to be conflicting reports between the imams' own descriptions of their behavior and the other witnesses. If they were trying to be "provocative," as some bloggers have accused, why on earth were they doing so? I can't help but think that if al Qaeda planned to use six religious leaders to blow up another airplane, they would know enough not to call such attention to themselves.

See Washington Times editorial, here.

I gotta think this is a case of people simply panicking unnecessarily.

But then today a new story: Our brand new Congressman Keith Ellison has said that he plans to take his oath of office with his hand on a copy of the Qur'an. And now some officious dunderheads are tsk tsking at his choice as "unAmerican":

"Mr. Ellison, America, not you, decides on what book its public servants take their oath," radio talk show host and author Dennis Prager wrote in his online column this week. He said that American Jews routinely have taken their oath on the Bible, even though they don't believe in the New Testament, and that if Ellison refuses to do so, "don't serve in Congress."

Good heavens, people. You make me absolutely ashamed to be classified with you as "Christians."

Edited to add: There has been some interesting discussion of the Ellison story over at cakmpls's journal here. And as some have pointed out, taking the oath on a Bible is not in any way a Constitutional requirement, but simply a custom that some Congressional representatives follow.

Comments

[knitmeapony.livejournal.com]

Er, Congresscritters don't use a bible to take the oath.

[juliansinger.livejournal.com]

I had not read these new assertions about the Imams, and frankly, I'm kind of dubious about them, particularly given people like Dennis Prager.

Anti-Muslim prejudice is rampant, and it's sickening.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

I suspect that in the case of the imams, they were a bit louder than they thought (aren't most us, often?), and that people around them who didn't speak Arabic and who were biased and uninformed heard what they expected to hear. And no, I doubt very much if everyone knows about the Muslim practices of prayer. Heck, there are a lot of people who believe that Catholics worship the statues of saints in their churches, and Catholics have been in mainstream awareness for a heck of a lot longer than Muslims have.

I wrote about the Ellison case a few days ago. A comment pointed out there, as knitmeapony does here, that Congresspeople aren't sworn in on a Bible as a matter of custom. However, apparently they can use one if they want to.

[ironymaiden]

the first story you link to is from the Washington Times a very different beast from the Post.

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

Whoops. Corrected. Thanks.

[tanaise.livejournal.com]

Are there Quaker congresspersons? I should know this, I know, but I don't. I do know that they would neither a) swear on a book of any sort or b) swear at all (we 'affirm'), so I wonder if there would be fuss about that.

(One of my housemates, also a Quaker, was disappointed when I told her the american legal system had caught on to quakers and the wording for jury duty is neutral enough that we are bound by it, and can't refuse it for religious reasons. (I think it's something like "I agree that everything I wrote here is the truth,") She'd been hoping to get out early. :)

[msavi.livejournal.com]

Good heavens, people. You make me absolutely ashamed to be classified with you as "Christians."

A-friggin'-men.

As to why the imams might have intentionally acted in a suspicious manner, if it was intentional, well...activists do stuff like this all the time, just to make a statement. Perhaps that's what the Muslim writer was objecting to in his Star Tribune editorial; perhaps he doesn't agree with the methods in which the imams chose to make their statement. I can't say that I do either, if this is indeed the case, but as long as no one got hurt or could have gotten hurt, then this doesn't set off any alarm bells for me.

About the imams

[dreamshark.livejournal.com]

About the imam flap - there's two sides to every story. That being the case, I declined to be outraged when I heard just the capsule description of the incident ("Imams detained for praying!"). Having read the followup stories with interest, I still think... there's two sides to every story (which is pretty much what you said).

Maybe some or all of the people involved were prejudiced against Muslims, but maybe the imams themselves were too oblivious to how they were behaving. Were they shouting their prayers or whispering them? Probably something in between. Were they loud enough to annoy people? I'm not disturbed by the concept of people praying, but am not at all receptive to people praying loudly in public (no matter what the religion).

Were they congregating in the aisles of the airplane? Sounds like it. Last time I flew, the airline had a new rule: no more than one person was allowed to stand "in line" for the bathroom because 2 or more people standing together in an airplane is now considered a threat! So there's no question that they were behaving suspiciously by at least one airline's definition. Did the imams know that? Likely not if they couldn't understand the pre-flight intro announcements. I doubt they were doing that to be provocative or because they were planning any mischief. But does that mean it wasn't suspicious behavior?

Did passengers complain about their conversation simply because it was in a foreign language? Maybe, but at least one passenger who was concerned about what he heard was said to speak Arabic. That changes the story quite a bit, doesn't it?

An interesting thought exercise: what behavior in an airport/airplane would you consider suspicious enough to report (as passengers are now being asked to do?).

[pameladean]

It sounds to me as if the imams actually believed that they lived in a free country where acting weird wouldn't get you in trouble.

Yeah.

P.

[joelrosenberg.livejournal.com]

Well, it's pretty easy to dismiss at least one side in this; it's the side where the spokesman is lying -- about a handcuffing that didn't happen, and a telephone call that didn't happen, dogs that weren't there and therefore didn't bark, etc.

http://powerlineblog.com/archives/016084.php

Why Shahin and the other Imam requested a seat belt extension for which they had no need; moved to first class, etc. is left as an exercise for the reader.

[trogon.livejournal.com]

Have these supposed new details been reported anywhere other than the Washington Times? (I see that although the editorial is now correctly marked you still say the story itself is in the Post, and in this case that's a fairly important difference of trustworthiness). The Washington Times isn't exactly a paragon of journalism, and I'd regard anything reported there and nowhere else with a healthy dose of skepticism. (For those who don't know, it's owned by the Moonies, and is well-known for being extremely and actively conservative -- see the SourceWatch report (http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Washington_Times).

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

Argh. Fixed that too. Sorry.

I don't know; I haven't had time this afternoon to run down all the sources/commentary for the story. Which is why I was saying I don't know what to think, but my general reaction is that people seem to have overreacted. Big time.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

I've read a lot of about the airplane incident, the The Washington Times reported things that were not said anywhere else. But, of course, what do you expect from that source?

This is my response.

B