In Horn Lake, Mississippi, a planned mosque was turned down this April by the Board of Alderman, who cited concerns about noise, traffic, and insufficient water for fire sprinklers. The ACLU is.now suing the city on behalf of the two Muslim men who were behind the project, claiming that the real reason for the denial was “anti-Muslim prejudice.” A report on the mosque contretemps is here: “Lawsuit: Anti-Muslim prejudice prompted city to block mosque,” Associated Press, November 3, 2021:
Leaders of a northern Mississippi city were motivated by anti-Muslim prejudice when they rejected a zoning request for what would be the first mosque in the area, according to a federal lawsuit filed Wednesday.
American Civil Liberties Union of Mississippi sued on behalf of the two Muslim men who want to build the mosque, Abraham House of God, in the city of Horn Lake.
Earlier this year, the Horn Lake planning commission recommended that the site plan for the mosque be denied, and the Board of Aldermen voted 5-1 in April to uphold that recommendation. Aldermen said they denied the application because of concerns about insufficient water supply for fire sprinklers and the possibility of traffic and noise.
“Despite the pretextual excuses for their decision, Board members did not work very hard to hide the true reason they denied approval for the project — anti-Muslim prejudice,” said the lawsuit, which represents one side of a legal argument. “As then-Alderman John E. Jones Jr. told the local newspaper: ‘I don’t care what they say, their religion says they can lie or do anything to the Jews or gentiles because we’re not Muslims.’”
The ACLU dismisses concerns over traffic and noise as merely “pretextual.” But a mosque is uniquely busy all day long; Muslim worshippers will be driving up at various times, from sunrise to well beyond sunset, seven days a week, to say one or more of their five daily prayers, in a residential neighborhood. Nor does ACLU rebut the other concern raised by the planning commission, about an insufficient water supply for the mosque’s sprinklers; it simply dismisses that, too, as “pretextual.”
The Associated Press left a phone message Wednesday for Horn Lake Mayor Allen Latimer at his City Hall office, seeking comment about the lawsuit. He did not respond after several hours.
The lawsuit argues the government officials violated the First Amendment rights of the men who want to develop the mosque, Maher Abuirshaid and Riyadh Elkhayyat. It also argues that city officials violated a federal law that gives heightened legal protections in land-use decisions to people and groups that face discrimination. The lawsuit asks a judge to nullify the Horn Lake officials’ decisions and to order the city to grant the land-use request for the mosque.
How are the Muslims in this case being discriminated against? Another building, having nothing to do with Muslims, were it deemed to cause the same level of traffic and noise from early in the morning to late at night, would surely be turned down. The ACLU simply refuses to believe that the concerns of the residents, who at a public hearing objected to being awakened at dawn or kept awake at night by traffic going in and out of the mosque, are real and not “pretextual.”
Horn Lake is in DeSoto County, which is just south of Memphis, Tennessee. Abuirshaid and Elkhayyat are DeSoto County residents and want to develop a mosque so their families and other Muslim families in DeSoto County will have a place to worship without having to drive a half-hour or more to Memphis.
A local mosque is critical for my family and the Muslim community in DeSoto County to practice our religion,” Abuirshaid said in a news release.
Numerous residents near the potential mosque site spoke against the project during a city planning meeting in February.
What did those residents at the city planning meeting say? This report, which first appeared at the AP, doesn’t tell us what their objections were. Apparently none of them said anything against Islam or Muslims, for had they done so, that would certainly have been mentioned in the story. Clearly there were other, perfectly valid worries, about the increase in traffic, early and late, and the concomitant noise, that a mosque would bring.
The mosque is intended to be a 10,000-square-foot (929-square-meter) building with a worship space that holds 156 people. It would have 44 parking spaces. Elkhayyat, who sometimes goes by the name Ray Elk, told Horn Lake aldermen that the building would not have outside loudspeakers to issue calls to prayer. He also said the mosque would have significantly less traffic than if he developed the site into a subdivision.
A “subdivision” – that is, a number of new houses – might have “less traffic” overall – assuming we were to accept Elkhayyat’s assertion, but it would be a very different kind of traffic, with people going to work in the morning and returning at suppertime, unlike the traffic to the mosque, that would begin with the Fajr prayer at sunrise and continue until when the Isha prayer is said at night.
“The freedom to worship is one of our most fundamental rights,” Heather Weaver, senior staff attorney for the ACLU Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief, said in the news release. “By discriminating against our clients simply because they are Muslim, Horn Lake officials violated that right, and they must be held accountable.”
The ACLU refuses to believe that anything other than anti-Muslim prejudice could possibly have prompted the Horn Lake aldermen to turn the plan down. It ignores the concerns expressed by both Horn Lake citizens and the Planning Commission, that had to do with traffic and noise, not “anti-Muslim prejudice.” The ACLU lawyers have exactly one bit of evidence to show “prejudice” — a statement made by Alderman John E. Jones Jr., who told the local newspaper: ‘I don’t care what they say, their religion says they can lie or do anything to the Jews or gentiles because we’re not Muslims.’”
Is that “prejudice” or is it a statement of the truth? Is there not a Muslim practice called Taqiyya, originating with the Shi’a but now adopted by Sunnis as well, which is religiously-sanctioned dissimulation, in order to protect both the Faith and the Believers? Didn’t Muhammad himself say, in a famous hadith, that “war is deceit”? Isn’t Allah praised as “the best of deceivers”? One hopes that in court, after the ACLU lawyers have quoted John Jones’ remark that “their religion says they can lie” as an example of “anti-Muslim prejudice,” these statements supporting his view will be adduced.
And there is more that, to the chagrin of the ACLU lawyers, ought to be mentioned in court. The Qur’an tells Muslims that they are “the best of peoples” (3:110) while non-Muslims are “the most vile of created beings” (98:6). Make sure, lawyers for Horn Lake, that you mention both, and that you provide other Qur’anic verses, too, in which Muslims are instructed “to fight” and “to kill” and “to smite at the necks of” and “to strike terror in the hearts of” the Infidels. Read aloud in court Qur’an 2:191-193, 3:151, 4:89, 8:12, 8:60, 9:5, 9:29, and 47:4, to support the notion that John Jones was expressing not “prejudice,” but a well-founded fear. Let the trial be one long teaching moment about Islam’s view of Infidels. The mosque may still be built, but the Muslims behind the mosque project, and their ACLU collaborators, will rue the day they ever decided to go to court, only to find their faith laid embarrassingly bare.
Brenda says
Muslims should have the same rights in the West as Christians and Jews in their countries.
Infidel says
Precisely!
Jim says
They should also not have more rights in the West than non-Muslims. It seems that illegal immigrants and Muslims are the most privileged people in America, despite all the chest-beating by leftists. They should be treated like other immigrants and expected to comply with the customs and laws of the country. There should be laws against outside countries and financing by foreigners of Musques and other Muslim institutions that are intended to mark and transform the landscape into a Muslim one. They should not be allowed to build minarets or in other ways stand out to mark the landscape. They should not be allowed to broadcast the call to prayer or pray in the street or impose other Muslim sharia laws on Western countries. But of course this is just what the leftists want to happen.
Mount Zion says
Exactly , go and try to build a non muslim house of worship in Saudi Arabia , Iran or Pakistan . The only way to avoid that building , is to have a herd of pigs move across that piece of land they wanna build the Mosque on .
James Lincoln says
Mount Zion,
A few years ago, the Polish government had been approached by Saudi Arabia regarding building a mosque in Warsaw, Poland.
The Polish government responded by saying that it would be okay if a Cathedral could also be built in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Crickets from Saudi Arabia.
ALL Western country should use this approach…
Infidel says
The sole purpose of a mosque in a non-muslim area is to mark that place as muslim. Today it’s a mosque, tomorrow the azaan and then watch property values plummet. How many muslims – aside from these 2 – are there in Horn Lake in the first place to justify this claim by the American Caliphate Liberties Union?
I live in a place where there are no Hindu temples nearby, and the nearest one is an hour’s drive from where I live. I don’t bitch about it: I simply drive whenever I need to go there. Freedom to worship means precisely that: it doesn’t mean that one has the right to build a mosque or a temple anywhere. There is no reason why these 2 can’t do their namaz at home or wherever they are, and drive to Memphis when needed. The ACLU, which never tires of preaching separation of church and state, is happy to gloss over this instead of telling those 2 to just worship wherever they feel like w/o requiring the state of Mississippi to effectively zone an area as islamic
GreekEmpress says
I’m beginning to abhor the ACLU as much as I do CAIR.
PS—I hear you! I drive an hour to worship also.
Kenneth J Johnson says
Since when does the town of Horn Lake need to cater to an organization that preaches
insurection, sedition, racial hatred, misogony and more. And the wishes of the people don’t count. Seventy years ago I admired the NAACP but it has lost its way. Is our American Dream in danger?? KEN
Ray Jarman says
“…156 people. It would have 44 parking spaces.” This means at prayer times there would be cars parked in front of private homes. Passengers and drivers would be making a lot of noise and how many children would be in danger of being injured by people who could care less about infidel children. They say no loud speakers but that would not last long as looking at past precedence when a mosque takes the locality to court to force those in the vicinity to endure being blasted five times with Allahu Akbar and other insulting rants. No one should have to endure such a pestilence in their neighborhood.
Infidel says
That assumes that all of the 44 cars would have 3-4 people each, which is rarely true, so you’re right: it would spill over into the streets. No reason for MS to feed that locality to the ummah
Keith O says
We have a similar situation in the suburb of Moorooka in Brisbane.
Getting down the street is almost impossible, I had abuse yelled at me for trying to get through and the little contact I had with the residents in the area was disturbing, they said they can’t move because their property values had plummeted and they were often blocked into their own homes by parked cars on most days.
Complaints to local government get nowhere and even the police are afraid to act for fear of the Islamophobic card being played.
This is what the people of Horn Lake have to look forward to!
Ugly Sid says
Islamic Expulsion.
Do it. Or disappear.
Aussie Infidel says
This is what happens when citizens of a country are denied the right to raise concerns about the evil tenets of particular creeds to stop their spread – because our constitutions stupidly guarantee ” freedom of religion”, without further qualification. To stop projects like mosques, the locals have to resort to using other measures like “excessive traffic and noise” – which are also genuine concerns, but secondary to the argument – while those pushing the proposal use lawfare to assert their ‘rights’, with the usual charges of “anti-Muslim prejudice”. Muslims have been using these tactics for decades in almost all countries of the world to establish new mosques, even though Islam is more political than religious, with an aggressive agenda to dominate the kafirs.
It’s about time legislators determined an acceptable definition of religion, otherwise we will always be fighting with one hand behind our backs – and eventually Islam will win. Is that the price we are willing to pay to not be called Islamophobes?
somehistory says
“Some people say a man is made out of mud”…remember when ‘o’ was siting in the oval with his dirty feet on the desk and his pretend “doj” was suing small cities to force them to allow the forts…barracks….of mozlums, no matter where they wanted to build and no matter what problems it would cause the local citizens?
If I recall correctly, he even made the little cities pay big bucks to the mozlums for having refused to allow based on zoning, etc.
Now that ‘o’ is back in the oval…by proxy…this is likely to go the same way. The mozlums realize that infidels have a lot of reason to abhor their practices…they know they create a lot of noise, a lot of traffic problems, and that at any given time, one of their members might become a mental case who is living in poverty, his girlfriend turns down his offers of kissy-face, and gets really fervent in “preyer” and goes out and knifes someone or runs over someone or blows up some building while shouting the **happy** cry of supremacy.
And, because they know people don’t want any of this…no matter how valid are the claims of traffic, water (too bad they can’t just let it burn), noise, parking problems, etc…they sue and whine that it’s all because of “anti-mozlum” discrimination.
I am one who “discriminates” in a lot of areas, and mozlums give all of us plenty of reason…all valid.
James Lincoln says
So, according to the feature article:
“The ACLU is now suing the city… claiming that the real reason for the denial was “anti-Muslim prejudice.”
According to Merriam-Webster, prejudice is:
1. an unfair feeling of dislike for a person or group because of race, sex, religion, etc.
2: a feeling of like or dislike for someone or something especially when it is not reasonable or logical.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/prejudice
Islam is a totalitarian religious/political ideology. The goal of its devout followers, muslims, is to impose sharia law throughout the world.
So the ACLU is saying that disliking devout followers of islam is “unfair”.
Amarose says
Everyone has a right to religion in the country, however, this is the south. We are still recovering from the muslim shooter at the Pensacola Naval Air Station. And we are starting to slowly see how the community around a mosque affects everyone around.
Lenny Leaps In says
I lived my childhood in a suburb of Perth (Australia) called Thornlie. We had a catholic school called Sacred Heart that was taken over by a Muslim school. They said at the time that it would only be a quiet school. Since then it has expanded and they eventually included a mosque. I feel so sorry for the people who live next to it. The street is filled with cars on Friday and it appears that at times you think you live in Baghdad or in Damascus. Property values have plummeted. Who wants to live near a mosque? Only muslims – who can now buy up cheaply.
gravenimage says
A Mosque In Horn Lake, Mississippi?
……………
Muslims *always* claim “Islamophobia”, no matter the issue. And the leftist ACLU is fgoolish enough to enable them there.
I just found this:
Religion in Horn Lake, Mississippi
55.0% of the people in Horn Lake are religious:
– 32.7% are Baptist
– 0.5% are Episcopalian
– 3.8% are Catholic
– 0.3% are Lutheran
– 6.9% are Methodist
– 3.1% are Pentecostal
– 1.0% are Presbyterian
– 0.5% are Church of Jesus Christ
– 6.1% are another Christian faith
– 0.0% are Judaism
– 0.0% are an eastern faith
– 0.0% affilitates with Islam
https://www.bestplaces.net/religion/city/mississippi/horn_lake
There are essentially no Muslims in Horn Lake. So this Mosque isn’t to serve Muslim residents–it is a beach head for later Muslim invaders. Glad it was turned down.