http://www.wnd.com/2012/12/tea-party-group-fights-for-islamic-causes/

WND EXCLUSIVE

'Tea party' group fights for Islamic causes

Claims it must rescue movement from 'evangelical, conservative Jewish bloc'

byAaron Klein

Far from being the lock-step GOP ground troop some in the media have suggested it is, the tea-party movement includes people of many different ideologies … but this element is most unusual.

WND has discovered a Muslim activist organization that claims to be working from within the tea party to counter the movement’s “Islamophobia.”

The group Muslims4Liberty, however, also decries American “greatness,” accuses the U.S. of “war crimes,” espouses seemingly anti-Israel ideology and slams the “evangelical and conservative Jewish bloc” of the Republican party.

The radical left Center for American Progress, or CAP, actually promotes Muslims4Liberty as a small organization of supposed tea-party activists “fighting against the right wing’s Islamophobia,” according to a CAP description.

Think Progress, the CAP’s official blog, noted how Illume Magazine documented the efforts of Will Coley, a self-proclaimed Tea Party member and Islam convert who co-founded Muslims4Liberty to confront “anti-Islam activists head on.”

Illume quotes Coley describing how he started going to tea-party events in Florida in 2009 but was concerned about the emergence of “Islamophobia” in the movement.

“I was watching the neocon takeover happen,” said Coley. “Literally overnight I saw groups devoted to economics and constitutional limits turn into something else. Suddenly there were invites to see anti-Islam speakers. This crazy anti-Islam message was taking over.”

After moving to Tennessee, Coley said he began outreach to local tea-party groups to explain how Islam and Shariah Islamic law is compatible with tea-party principles.

Illume reports that after speaking with 14 tea-party chapters about Shariah, 12 agreed to reject so-called anti-Muslim appeals.

The chapters even supported a petition opposing a proposed “Shariah ban” in Tennessee.

Tea Party aligned with Shariah?

Coley gave lectures to tea-party chapters purporting to explain how Shariah promotes liberty.

Stated Coley: “We use principles within Shariah like maqasid (primary goals) to show their connection with John Locke’s principles of life, liberty and property.”

Shariah law, however, has often been decried as incompatible with the values of liberty or democracy.

The doctrine, for example, does not allow Muslims to be ruled by non-Muslims and calls for a special “protection” tax against all non-Muslims.

Furthermore, it dictates non-Muslims living in an Islamic state cannot build new churches or synagogues. Muslims who kill non-Muslims do not get the death penalty.

Multiple other aspects of Shariah, including its view of non-Muslims as unequal or its treatment of women and minorities, are arguably incompatible with constitutional principals as well.

‘Religious bloc destroying GOP’

Views espoused by Coley and his group on its website would similarly distance Muslims4Liberty from the views of many tea partiers.

One posting by Coley, entitled, “Dear Religious Right,” slams the GOP’s “evangelical and conservative Jewish block [sic]” as destroying the GOP.

He defined this supposed bloc as “a portion of our country that wants to legislate its own moral views on the rest of us and outlaw or stifle the rights of other religious traditions in the name of ‘patriotism’ or ‘national security.’”

Coley blamed this religious bloc for contributing to Romney’s loss in the November elections.

He added: “The GOP can trace it’s dwindling numbers directly to the amount of influence your message has had over the party. The more influence radical religious nativists hold over the party, the less the GOP message appealed to voters.”

Coley’s posting was replete with a derogatory, photo-shopped picture of tea-party favorite Sarah Palin draped in an American flag and holding a cross.

American ‘war crimes;’ No U.S. ‘greatness’

Another Muslims4Liberty posting tea partiers may find offensive contains an image of the U.S. flag with text that reads: “War Crimes Alert! There is no flag big enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people! Ever!”

The posting, titled, “American Supremacy Disorder,” decries any notion of U.S. “greatness.”

Muslims4Liberty member Ramny Osman complains, “The whole idea of ‘American greatness,’ ‘America the world super power’ or ‘American supremacy’ is a problem in itself.”

“I’m not going to deny that there are great things in America, or deny that great things have been accomplished by Americans,” Osman states. “But I do challenge the idea that we Americans have exclusive claim to great things.”

Osman mockingly provided a list of “10 symptoms” of those who suffer from a “disorder” that see American “greatness.”

The list is as follows:

1. They repeatedly recite the self-delusion mantra: “We’re the greatest country in the world!”;
2. They complain about local inequality while insisting on a sense of entitlement that causes global inequality;
3. They justify or are indifferent to American sponsored coups, assassinations, and sabotage around the world;
4. They support bombing and occupying countries that never attacked us (i.e. there were no Iraqis or Afghanis part of the 9-11 attacks);
5. They think that the only 9-11 in history happened in 2001 (On 9-11-1973, America sponsored a coup in Chile that killed their democratically elected president);
6. They view half a million children who died in Iraq due to American imposed sanctions to be collateral damage that was worth it;
7. They don’t consider Muslim civilians killed by American bombs and bullets as innocent;
8. They confuse America’s interests with Israel’s interests to the point that any criticism of Israel (or mention of Palestinian suffering) is considered anti-Semitic and unpatriotic;
9. They think that the people who hate us and attack us do so because of our “freedoms” (which is code word for ‘world supremacy’);
10. They say if you oppose the Patriot Act then you’re unpatriotic.

The website is also replete with seemingly anti-Israel language, including text that refers to the West Bank as “the occupied West Bank,” even though the United Nations itself only calls the area, home to biblical Jewish communities, “disputed.” The site calls for all aid to be cut off to Israel as well as to other foreign countries.