New Jersey Misunderstanders of Islam actually thought Islam teaches "subordination of women"!

Honest Ibe Hooper, call your office! "The faces of hate: Jersey jihadis junior hellions," by Carolyn Salazar, Perry Chiaramonte and Chuck Bennett for the New York Post, June 9:

...Officials last night released the mug shots of New Jersey terror suspects Mohamed Alessa, 20, and Carlos "Omar" Almonte, 24.

They were taken after the two hate-spewing terrorist wannabes were captured as they headed to Somalia, allegedly to wage holy war on Americans.

Their neighbors weren't surprised -- they said jihad started early for the two.

Now that's a surprising and refreshing departure from the usual "neighbors were shocked and said they were quiet, gentle souls" claptrap that the mainstream media usually serves up after jihadis are arrested.

They were terrors in their suburban communities years before they were busted last Saturday at Kennedy Airport.

Not a single school could handle Alessa. He openly talked of blowing up his schools in the name of Islam.

Almonte was picked up by cops several times for increasingly violent behavior.

The duo are due back in Newark federal court today for a bail hearing on charges of plotting to murder, maim and kidnap people overseas.

Back when Alessa was a North Bergen HS student in early 2005, officials there were so troubled by his radical-Islam-inspired rants that they contacted Homeland Security.

Even the Al Huda School, an Islamic institution in Paterson, couldn't handle him, and he left after few months in 2005.

Later that year, when he was transferred to KAS Prep, an alternative school for troubled teens, the outbursts continued, a school official said.

Yet this guy, with this rap sheet, was still on the street as of a few days ago. Why?

He recalled that Alessa had his own misinterpretation of Islam, claiming that the religion required the subordination of women and the mutilation of gays.

Horror of horrors! A misinterpretation of Islam! How could Alessa have misunderstood Islam so thoroughly as to think it required the "subordination of women"? Could he have read this verse? "Men have authority over women because Allah has made the one superior to the other" (Qur'an 4:34). Could he have read on in the same verse to see its prescription for what should be done to disobedient women -- "beat them"? Could he have gotten the idea from some of these other Qur'anic passages?

The Qur'an likens a woman to a field (tilth), to be used by a man as he wills: "Your women are a tilth for you (to cultivate) so go to your tilth as ye will" (2:223).

The Qur'an also declares that a woman's testimony is worth half that of a man: "Get two witnesses, out of your own men, and if there are not two men, then a man and two women, such as ye choose, for witnesses, so that if one of them errs, the other can remind her" (2:282).

It allows men to marry up to four wives, and have sex with slave girls also: "If ye fear that ye shall not be able to deal justly with the orphans, marry women of your choice, two or three or four; but if ye fear that ye shall not be able to deal justly (with them), then only one, or (a captive) that your right hands possess, that will be more suitable, to prevent you from doing injustice" (4:3).

It rules that a son's inheritance should be twice the size of that of a daughter: "Allah (thus) directs you as regards your children's (inheritance): to the male, a portion equal to that of two females" (4:11).

It allows for marriage to pre-pubescent girls, stipulating that Islamic divorce procedures "shall apply to those who have not yet menstruated" (65:4).

But the New York Post tells us that it's a "misinterpretation" of Islam to think that it requires the "subordination of women."

As for "mutilation of gays," sure. Usually Muslim countries punish homosexual activity with fines or a whipping, but not with mutilation. So the Post actually gets one right.

Alessa even said he wanted to organize a squad of Muslims to blow up the school, the Bergen Record said yesterday.

Almonte, a Dominican-born convert to Islam whose family said was "brainwashed" by Alessa, likewise made a name for himself.

He was busted several times in 2004 for his involvement in a bloody brawl in a parking lot, plotting an after-school rumble, bringing a knife to class and drinking a 40-ounce bottle of beer in a park.

Almonte smashed a picture frame over his brother Elvin's skull and then bit his mother on the arm in an altercation sparked by his nonstop "preaching" that they needed to convert to Islam, according to a May 31, 2009, police report.

This is not all that incongruous. Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, told his followers to invite the unbelievers to accept Islam, and to fight them if they refused: ""When you meet your enemies who are polytheists, invite them to three courses of action. If they respond to any one of these, you also accept it and withhold yourself from doing them any harm. Invite them to (accept) Islam; if they respond to you, accept it from them and desist from fighting against them....If they refuse to accept Islam, demand from them the Jizya. If they agree to pay, accept it from them and hold off your hands. If they refuse to pay the tax, seek Allah's help and fight them" (Sahih Muslim 4294).

Sister Ingrid Almonte, 17, blamed Alessa for turning her brother bad.

"He brainwashed him and tried to convert us, too," Ingrid, 17, said outside the family's Elmwood home.

The pair talked of the best ways to chop off their victims' heads and said they'd eagerly wage jihad back home as battle-hardened veterans, according to the federal complaint....