British imam praises London Tube bombers

[Spankydem]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-2036538,00.html

A LEADING imam in the mosque where the July 7 bombers worshipped has hailed their terrorist attack on London as a “good” act in a secretly taped conversation with an undercover reporter. Hamid Ali, spiritual leader of the mosque in West Yorkshire, said it had forced people to take notice when peaceful meetings and conferences had no impact.

He also praised the bombers as the “children” of Abdullah al-Faisal, a firebrand Muslim cleric, who was convicted of inciting murder and racial hatred in 2003.Ali revealed that the leader of the London suicide bombers had attended sermons in Yorkshire by al-Faisal and tapes of al-Faisal’s teachings were still circulating within his mosque.

Al-Faisal, who has branded non-Muslims as “cockroaches” ripe for extermination, is serving a seven-year prison sentence but is eligible for early release next week.

snip

The disclosures come as a Sunday Times-YouGov poll today shows that people are gloomy about the prospects of living in peaceful coexistence with Britain’s Muslim community. Nearly two-thirds, 63%, think that tensions will rise and only 17% are optimistic about the outlook. By 10 to one, 52% to 5%, people say that recent events have made them less tolerant of other religions.

[Missy M]

1. Why does a spiritual leader praise the killing of innocent....

people. Why do leaders spiritual or otherwise condone killing innocent people and then claim they believe in God, Allah or whatever. These same leaders never seem to be the people in the line of fire. They would sure change their tune if they were.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

3. Personally, I think anyone who advocates killing like this

is not following the teachings of their faith. They may say they are spiritual leaders, but that doesn't make them spiritual leaders. Spiritual leaders I know are known by their actions, which are in accordance to the teachings of their particular spiritual tradition.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. What I would like to know

is the number of members of the Yorkshire mosque, and what percentage of all Muslims in Britain this mosque represents. Why? I just don't know how popular these imams really are with regular Muslims. They aren't like Pat Robertson with a TV show and company that brings in tons of money, whose popularity and numbers of followers can be roughly estimated. Knowing how Islam is structured differently than Christianity, with no overall leader of Muslims, I'm wondering how infuential these fellows really are.

[Missy M]

4. Hopefully, they aren't all that influential and appeal only to...

the radicals. I can't imagine this kind of rhetoric appealing to the majority of Muslims. Unfortunately, the radicals are the perpetrators of all the carnage and killing.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

7. I hope so too

I feel that Muslims are being painted as all being radicals. I've talked to folks I have known for years who have some very strange notions of Islam, the main one being that there is one great leader for Islam like the Pope for Catholics, and that everyone follows him.

[Missy M]

8. I agree that all Muslims are being painted as radicals and it is...

simply not true. Most people do not know the first thing about Islam and have a preconceived idea that it is all about radicals running around as suicide bombers and wanting to kill themselves so they can be with 21 virgins or some such ridiculous thing. We should probably all become more educated about Islam, myself included.

[savemefromdumbya]

5. Is this Ali one of cheney's patsies?

[DoYouEverWonder]

6. I didn't see much difference between what this guy is preaching

and some of what comes out of Robertson and Falwel's mouths.