Yesterday, I mentioned anti-Muslim crusader Steve Emerson in a post about Rep. Steve King’s planned congressional investigation of “radicalized Islam” in Muslim-American communities. As part of that mention, I linked to an article on Emerson’s website, Investigative Project on Terrorism, in which Emerson accused New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie of having a “strange relationship with radical Islam” because he nominated a Muslim, Sohail Mohammed, for a state judgeship.
Well, today, Think Progress reports that the group of far right bloggers who have made it their mission to spread hate and fear against any Muslim who openly supports interfaith dialogue, and/or who does not clearly and unequivocally refuse to defend, or advocate or speak out for, or sympathize with, the concept that Muslims have the same individual rights and civil liberties that every other American possesses, are now going into full-scale attack mode against Gov. Christie (emphasis is in the original):
Last week, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (R) announced seven judgeship appointments to the New Jersey Superior Court, including the appointment of Sohail Mohammed to serve on the court in Passaic County. Mohammed is an immigration lawyer in Clifton, NJ who notably defended many Muslims caught up in post-Sept. 11 dragnets, in which the Department of Justice quickly and secretly arrested hundreds of Muslims in the wake of the attacks. Often, the false pretense of an immigration violation was used to hold these men for many months, even though a vast majority of them had no connection to terrorism whatsoever.Several prominent anti-Muslim voices on the right have reacted with characteristic vitriol to the elevation of a Muslim in the U.S. justice system, calling Mohammed “the enemy” and accusing Christie of turning New Jersey into a “Sharia State.” A sampling of their response:
– In a widely linked post, “Governor Christie’s Dirty Islamist Ties,” blogger Daniel Greenfield writes that “New Jersey, the Garden State, has just taken its first step toward becoming the Sharia State,” and criticized Christie for being “willing to stand up to the teacher’s union, but not to the terrorist’s union.”
– Hate blogger Pamela Geller, in a post titled “Governor Christie’s Hamas Pick for Superior Judgeship,” declared Christie’s political career over: “Governor Christie looked and sounded like he could be presidential. He’s not. He’s in bed with the enemy. All the other stuff doesn’t matter if you don’t have your freedom.”
– At Commentary magazine, Jonathan S. Tobin wrote a post about Christie’s “troubling appointment,” and charged that Christie’s “appointment of Sohail Mohammed to the court shows that his judgment on the issue of support for terrorism is highly questionable.”
– The Investigative Project on Terrorism warned Christie’s appointment of an “Islamist” to a judgeship “betrays either naivete or calculation. Either is troubling.”
– PowerLine blog took extra pains to note that “The attorney’s name is Mohammed, first name Sohail — Sohail Mohammed.”
The writers frequently label Mohammed a defender of “suspected terrorists,” but uniformly fail to note that the dragnet resulted in no substantial terrorism prosecutions. They also cannot point to clients of Mohammed’s who were a “terrorist” — except for poorly-sourced allegations against one client, Mohammed Qatanani, the head of one of New Jersey’s largest mosques. He was nearly deported for alleged connections to Hamas, but was later cleared of the charges and allowed to stay in the country, with the support of then-U.S. Attorney Chris Christie. Of course, even if Mohammed did indeed defend “terrorists,” that’s perfectly acceptable and ethical in the American justice system, as the Constitution mandates that everyone is entitled to legal defense and due process.
Doug Mataconis comments:
I know this doesn’t represent the attitude of everyone on the right, but the extent to which anti-Muslim bigotry like this is accepted and encouraged and given support is really rather disturbing.
This is the context — this encouragement and support for anti-Muslim bigotry, as well as the apathy and indifference toward it among even those who don’t actively encourage or support it — in which Steve King’s upcoming committee hearings to investigate “radicalized Islam” in Muslim-American communities should be viewed. The time to show some concern about this issue is NOW — not after things have gotten so bad that even the deniers can’t deny it anymore.
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