Siham_s
09-09-10, 21:09
Colin Freeze
Globe and Mail Update and Associated Press
Published on Monday, Sep. 06, 2010 10:23PM EDT
Last updated on Tuesday, Sep. 07, 2010 1:49PM EDT
“Doctor” Terry Jones, a pistol-packing Christian preacher who leads prayers at a 50-person Florida church, has made his name by inflaming Muslims.
A year ago, the Floridian printed T-shirts and signs declaring that “Islam is of the Devil.” Now, he wants the world to watch on Saturday as he launches what he calls “International Burn a Koran Day” – on the ninth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
Fears about Islam as a political force are mounting in the United States as millions of citizens debate whether a mosque should be built near the site of the reconstructed World Trade Center in New York City.
Yet it’s Mr. Jones and his Florida congregation who are taking Islamophobia to new heights.
“It’s not too late for America,” he says in a video posted to his website. “But it’s too late for Europe.” Speaking over footage of a crowd of unruly British Muslims threatening bombings against the West, he says: “Who’d have thought a nation that conquered the world is today being conquered by Islam?”
Mr Jones said Tuesday that he will go ahead with plans to burn copies of the Koran this weekend despite a warning from the top U.S. general in Afghanistan that doing so would endanger American troops.
He left the door open to change his mind, however, saying that he is still praying about his decision.
General David Petraeus warned Tuesday in an e-mail to The Associated Press that “images of the burning of a [Koran] would undoubtedly be used by extremists in Afghanistan — and around the world — to inflame public opinion and incite violence.”
Mr. Jones told the AP in a phone interview that he is also concerned but wonders how many times the U.S. can back down.
“We think it's time to turn the tables, and instead of possibly blaming us for what could happen, we put the blame where it belongs — on the people who would do it,” he said. “And maybe instead of addressing us, we should address radical Islam and send a very clear warning that they are not to retaliate in any form.”
The Vatican newspaper says Christians around the world are protesting the plan to burn the Qur'an on the Sept. 11 anniversary.
“No one burns the Qur'an,” read the headline in Tuesday's L'Osservatore Romano.
The article summarized criticism from Catholic bishops, including Archbishop Lawrence John Saldanha of Lahore, Pakistan, who condemned the plan as “contrary to the respect owed all religions and against our doctrine and faith.”
Stoking fears about Islam have helped the Dove World Outreach Centre in Gainesville, Fla., emerge as another polarizing front in America’s culture war. Yet the pastor’s rants may be having their most profound effects on the military conflicts raging outside U.S. borders.
On Monday, hundreds of Afghans reacted to news of the proposed Koran-burning event by burning the U.S. flag instead. “We know this is not just the decision of a church. It is the decision of the President and the entire United States,” a man named Abdul Shakoor, 18, told The Associated Press.
Earlier on the weekend, thousands of Indonesian Muslims circled the U.S. embassy in Jakarta to denounce the scheduled book burning. An international Islamist group known as Hizb-ut-Tahir (Party of Liberation) organized the protest.
Fundamentalist Muslims venerate their holy book as the literal word of God as revealed to the Prophet Mohammed, and the faithful go to great lengths to treat it with utmost respect. Any public promise of a Koran burning, then, is guaranteed to alarm people and garner attention.
Mocking of the religiosity of Islam has tapped a wellspring of fury in the recent past, especially after political Islamists seized the opportunity to mobilize the masses. In 2005, a Danish newspaper published cartoons lampooning the Prophet Mohammed. This spawned a wave of embassy protests, a short-lived trade embargo and even an international murder conspiracy targeting the cartoonist.
Now another marginal figure may have succeeded in getting himself into the crosshairs of the overzealous.
In a recent interview, Mr. Jones said he always carries a .40-calibre sidearm with him these days. The Federal Bureau of Investigation is said to be on the lookout for trouble in coming days. The local Fox News affiliate has even reported that a “homicide bomber” – the network’s term – could be heading to the town.
Mr. Jones has already publicly complained that his anti-Islam stance has led a bank – the Royal Bank of Canada – to call in the outstanding $140,000 balance on the church earlier this year. Insuring the building, he says, has become all but impossible.
Meanwhile, media calls keep flooding into the Dove World Outreach Centre, which solicits donations for the church on its website. A secretary said Mr. Jones couldn’t speak to The Globe and Mail yesterday – he had too many media interviews already lined up.
With a report from Associated Press
U.S. preachers plan to burn Koran inflames Muslims - The Globe and Mail (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/americas/us-preachers-plan-to-burn-koran-inflames-muslims/article1697677/)
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Globe and Mail Update and Associated Press
Published on Monday, Sep. 06, 2010 10:23PM EDT
Last updated on Tuesday, Sep. 07, 2010 1:49PM EDT
“Doctor” Terry Jones, a pistol-packing Christian preacher who leads prayers at a 50-person Florida church, has made his name by inflaming Muslims.
A year ago, the Floridian printed T-shirts and signs declaring that “Islam is of the Devil.” Now, he wants the world to watch on Saturday as he launches what he calls “International Burn a Koran Day” – on the ninth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
Fears about Islam as a political force are mounting in the United States as millions of citizens debate whether a mosque should be built near the site of the reconstructed World Trade Center in New York City.
Yet it’s Mr. Jones and his Florida congregation who are taking Islamophobia to new heights.
“It’s not too late for America,” he says in a video posted to his website. “But it’s too late for Europe.” Speaking over footage of a crowd of unruly British Muslims threatening bombings against the West, he says: “Who’d have thought a nation that conquered the world is today being conquered by Islam?”
Mr Jones said Tuesday that he will go ahead with plans to burn copies of the Koran this weekend despite a warning from the top U.S. general in Afghanistan that doing so would endanger American troops.
He left the door open to change his mind, however, saying that he is still praying about his decision.
General David Petraeus warned Tuesday in an e-mail to The Associated Press that “images of the burning of a [Koran] would undoubtedly be used by extremists in Afghanistan — and around the world — to inflame public opinion and incite violence.”
Mr. Jones told the AP in a phone interview that he is also concerned but wonders how many times the U.S. can back down.
“We think it's time to turn the tables, and instead of possibly blaming us for what could happen, we put the blame where it belongs — on the people who would do it,” he said. “And maybe instead of addressing us, we should address radical Islam and send a very clear warning that they are not to retaliate in any form.”
The Vatican newspaper says Christians around the world are protesting the plan to burn the Qur'an on the Sept. 11 anniversary.
“No one burns the Qur'an,” read the headline in Tuesday's L'Osservatore Romano.
The article summarized criticism from Catholic bishops, including Archbishop Lawrence John Saldanha of Lahore, Pakistan, who condemned the plan as “contrary to the respect owed all religions and against our doctrine and faith.”
Stoking fears about Islam have helped the Dove World Outreach Centre in Gainesville, Fla., emerge as another polarizing front in America’s culture war. Yet the pastor’s rants may be having their most profound effects on the military conflicts raging outside U.S. borders.
On Monday, hundreds of Afghans reacted to news of the proposed Koran-burning event by burning the U.S. flag instead. “We know this is not just the decision of a church. It is the decision of the President and the entire United States,” a man named Abdul Shakoor, 18, told The Associated Press.
Earlier on the weekend, thousands of Indonesian Muslims circled the U.S. embassy in Jakarta to denounce the scheduled book burning. An international Islamist group known as Hizb-ut-Tahir (Party of Liberation) organized the protest.
Fundamentalist Muslims venerate their holy book as the literal word of God as revealed to the Prophet Mohammed, and the faithful go to great lengths to treat it with utmost respect. Any public promise of a Koran burning, then, is guaranteed to alarm people and garner attention.
Mocking of the religiosity of Islam has tapped a wellspring of fury in the recent past, especially after political Islamists seized the opportunity to mobilize the masses. In 2005, a Danish newspaper published cartoons lampooning the Prophet Mohammed. This spawned a wave of embassy protests, a short-lived trade embargo and even an international murder conspiracy targeting the cartoonist.
Now another marginal figure may have succeeded in getting himself into the crosshairs of the overzealous.
In a recent interview, Mr. Jones said he always carries a .40-calibre sidearm with him these days. The Federal Bureau of Investigation is said to be on the lookout for trouble in coming days. The local Fox News affiliate has even reported that a “homicide bomber” – the network’s term – could be heading to the town.
Mr. Jones has already publicly complained that his anti-Islam stance has led a bank – the Royal Bank of Canada – to call in the outstanding $140,000 balance on the church earlier this year. Insuring the building, he says, has become all but impossible.
Meanwhile, media calls keep flooding into the Dove World Outreach Centre, which solicits donations for the church on its website. A secretary said Mr. Jones couldn’t speak to The Globe and Mail yesterday – he had too many media interviews already lined up.
With a report from Associated Press
U.S. preachers plan to burn Koran inflames Muslims - The Globe and Mail (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/americas/us-preachers-plan-to-burn-koran-inflames-muslims/article1697677/)
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