[HANASHIR:11277] Re: Response to Shirona and Sholom.

[Sholom Simon <sholom...>]

At 08:36 AM 4/10/2002 -0400, Judah Cohen wrote:
>That is fine, Sholom.  I am aware of these issues, though it is good you
>brought them out into the open.  The New York Times covered Gameaha as well.
>It would have been nice, though, had you also mentioned that Gemeaha left
>the mosque before making these remarks, and that the remarks were criticized
>and denounced by other prominent Muslim leaders, including Gemeaha's
>successor (though, granted, he did not criticize the remarks as deeply as
>the ADL would have wanted him to do, as they mention in an open letter).
>(http://www.canoe.ca/CNEWSAttack011024/24_mosque-ap.html)

I did not intentionally try to leave out anything.  It was unclear to me
which remarks were made before and which were made after leaving.

Note, e.g., this quote from the St Petersburg Times of 11/11/01, which also
talks about his successor:

"Sheik Muhammad Gemeaha, the imam of the Islamic Cultural Center of New
York at the time of the Sept. 11 attacks, claimed Zionists in U.S. air
traffic control towers were involved in the suicide hijackings, and he
accused Jewish doctors in the United States of poisoning Muslim children.
After Sheik Gemeaha was hastily recalled to Egypt, his successor, Imam Omar
Saleem Abu-Namous, added to tensions by criticizing Washington for offering
no proof that Osama bin Laden or any other Muslim was involved in the Sept.
11 attacks."

And, speaking of his successor:

>From an Education update: "In referring to the men who committed the
heinous crimes in New York, the Imam [Abu-Namous] said it was not proven
that they were Muslims."

In the ADL letter you mention, Abu-Namous is also claimed to have linked
the 9/11 attacks to Israel's treatment of the Palestinians.  See
<http://www.adl.org/ny/nyro_imamletter.html>

Seth Lipsky, in another article, writes:

   A reporter of the Jewish Forward newspaper, Rachel Donadio,
   interviewed the new imam at the Manhattan mosque, Omar Saleem
   Abu-Namous. He distanced himself from some of his predecessor's
   ugliest comments, though he refused to take a position on the view
   that Jews were behind Sept. 11 attacks.

   And he, too, sought to justify the suicide attacks on Jews in
   Israel."I cannot condemn them because of this," the new, supposedly
   moderate Imam told Ms. Donadio, whose Q&A is posted [54]here. "They
   have a good cause to fight for."

>If you want to see more, then come the Center:  for the last several months,
>the sign outside its gates has been flashing messages of peace and
>anti-aggression, many quoted from the Quran, and denouncing the terrorist
>acts in NYC.  

If he doesn't define suicide bombing as agression, then what's the point?

I presume you are aware that the recent Islamic conference passed a
resolution condemning terrorism, specifically adding that what the
Palestinians are doing is not terrorism, but self-defense.

-- Sholom
+-------------------------------------------------------+
|   Sholom Simon     | sholom (at) aishdas(dot)org               |
+-------------------------------------------------------+
| proud daddy to Joshua Ari  4/18/93 - 27 Nissan 5753   |
|        and Eliana Rebekah  3/12/95 - 11 Adar-2 5755   |
+-------------------------------------------------------+

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