Muslim religious leaders removed from a Minneapolis flight last week exhibited behavior associated with a security probe by terrorists and were not merely engaged in prayers, according to witnesses, police reports and aviation security officials.People are free to judge this incident on its face, but I believe the American public is not going to appreciate Democrat party members siding with people who behave like this. Let the Democrats embrace these dubious characters at their own peril.
Witnesses said three of the imams were praying loudly in the concourse and repeatedly shouted "Allah" when passengers were called for boarding US Airways Flight 300 to Phoenix.
"I was suspicious by the way they were praying very loud," the gate agent told the Minneapolis Police Department.
Passengers and flight attendants told law-enforcement officials the imams switched from their assigned seats to a pattern associated with the September 11 terrorist attacks and also found in probes of U.S. security since the attacks -- two in the front row first-class, two in the middle of the plane on the exit aisle and two in the rear of the cabin.
"That would alarm me," said a federal air marshal who asked to remain anonymous. "They now control all of the entry and exit routes to the plane."
A pilot from another airline said: "That behavior has been identified as a terrorist probe in the airline industry."
But the imams who were escorted off the flight in handcuffs say they were merely praying before the 6:30 p.m. flight on Nov. 20, and yesterday led a protest by prayer with other religious leaders at the airline's ticket counter at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.
Mahdi Bray, executive director of the Muslim American Society Freedom Foundation, called removing the imams an act of Islamophobia and compared it to racism against blacks.
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1 comment:
I think their behavior was very calculated. IMO, they knew full well they were drawing attention to themselves and did so deliberately. Why? 1. some people are so sick they get off on this sort of "power trip" or 2. they figured it was win-win. If they don't get pulled off, they intimidate the other passengers. If they do, the scream racism.
Frankly I saw something like this myself when I was flying back from Florida two years ago. The guy next to me was reading some little book in Arabic (Koran? I have no idea) then pouncing out of his seat, pacing around, going to the bathroom frequently. I think he was just some sick bast-rd who got thrills thinking he was scaring people. Don't put it past them.
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