In the words of his admirer, the Islamochristian and former CNN Mideast editor Octavia Nasr, Fadlallah “hated with a vengeance the United States government and Israel,” “regularly praised the terror attacks that killed Israeli citizens,” was a Holocaust denier, and was “designated a terrorist by the U.S. Treasury Department.”
The mainstream media constantly demands of us that we assume, without examination, that most Muslims in the U.S. — all but a few “wackos,” such as are found in “any religious group” — are loyal citizens who love Constitutional liberties, abhor jihad terrorism, and have no intention of bringing Sharia here, at any time or in any way, in whole or in part, now or in the future.
So why would “thousands” of Shi’ites in Detroit be mourning this cleric, who green-lighted the 1983 Hizballah attack on the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, killing 241? Hizballah’s founder Hassan Nasrallah has said, “If they (Jews) all gather in Israel, it will save us the trouble of going after them worldwide.” Wouldn’t patriotic, pluralistic American Muslims oppose Fadlallah, and not engage in such a public display of mourning, simply as a matter of principle?
Or could it be that we’ve been sold a bill of goods about what Muslims in the U.S. really think, and need to examine that subject much more closely?
Meanwhile, the noble Niraj Warikoo of the Detroit Free Press tells his readers that this bloodthirsty jihadist was “controversial.” Yes, the U.S. government makes some claims about him, but the Muslim leaders mourning him in Detroit say those claims are inaccurate, and well now, that settles it, doesn’t it?
More on this story. Tiny Minority of Extremists Update: “Popular, controversial Muslim cleric mourned,” by Niraj Warikoo for the Detroit Free Press, July 10:
Thousands of Shia Muslims in metro Detroit are mourning the death of Sayyed Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, a Lebanese cleric who was enormously popular locally but controversial to his critics. Six nights of memorial services at three Shia mosques conclude Sunday at the Islamic Center of America in Dearborn.
Fadlallah, 74, who had been ill, died Sunday. He was considered a top scholar in the Shia Muslim world, a grand ayatollah whose views had a great deal of influence on everything from marital relations to women to politics. In Dearborn, he was probably the most respected cleric among Lebanese-American Shia Muslims, according to experts and local leaders.
Speaking to hundreds this week inside the Islamic Institute of Knowledge in Dearborn, Imam Mohammed Elahi of the Islamic House of Wisdom in Dearborn Heights said that Fadlallah was a “man of peace, man of justice … a man of antiterrorism and antiviolence.”
The U.S. government, however, considered Fadlallah to be a terrorism supporter and spiritual leader of Hizballah. It says he sanctioned the 1983 bombing of the Marine Corps barracks in Beirut. Fadlallah’s supporters say those claims are inaccurate and that he often criticized terrorism.
To many, he was seen as a progressive who was a strong supporter of women’s rights….
Yes, as a Sharia supporter, he no doubt strongly supported a woman’s right to be beaten if disobedient (Qur’an 4:34), to be one of a stable of four women (plus slave girls) servicing a man (Qur’an 4:3), to have her testimony counted as half that of a man (Qur’an 2:282), etc. etc. etc.