Ultra right-wing Jewish zealots keeps up media attacks against new Boston mosque.
The Boston Globe has published an op-ed by Charles Jacobs, founder of The David Project, who throws around fear-mongering cliches about ‘Wahhabis,’ ‘the Muslim Brotherhood,’ and ‘Saudi money’ to incite fear and mistrust of the new mosque.
Jacobs implies he cares deeply about the local Muslim community:
Does the city’s willingness to cooperate with such people constitute a great betrayal of the local Muslim community?
The piece is a pure smear on the reputation of the mosque, its supporters, and Muslims generally, with the only action suggested being that “it is way past time for sensible citizens to demand answers to questions about the leaders of the new Islamic Center in Roxbury.”
In an article published two years ago in the Jewish Daily Forward, Jonathan Sarna, a professor of Jewish history at Brandeis University, made this pejorative comment about the work of The David Project:
I think it would be a very unfortunate thing if the Jewish community in the United States were to create an atmosphere that implied open warfare with Muslims in their midst.
At the same time Jacobs was fretting over the “betrayal” of Boston’s Muslim community, his organization was joining in a new partnership with Aish Hatorah according to The David Project’s home page. Aish Hatorah is the cultish Israel advocacy organization that was behind the “Obsession DVD” and the national effort to inflame fear and hatred of Muslims during last year’s presidential campaign.
Jacobs is listed as an “expert” with the speakers bureau/public relations firm Benador Associates, founded by Eleana Benador, a stridently neoconservative group that also counts Charles Krauthammer and Daniel Pipes’ father Richard among its stable of speakers.
If you read something that advocates regime change in the New York Post, or if you see a ‘political adviser’ on Fox News suggesting that Israel hasn’t gone far enough in its attacks on Hizbullah, there’s a good possibility that the appearance has been engineered by Mrs. Benador.
In 2006, Eleana Benador admitted her firm planted a fake story that received international media coverage about Iran passing a law requiring Jewish residents to wear a yellow insignia — reminiscent of the policies of Germany’s Nazi regime. The story was completely false.
(via)

Len 10:50 pm on July 9, 2009 Permalink |
Meh.
It’s kind of funny…a new (relocated?) masjid just opened up on the outskirts of the city in its own building, smack dab in the middle of a heavily Russian-Jewish neighborhood no less, seemingly without incident, but I’ve been hearing about this Roxbury mosque thing for a few years…I haven’t been following it too closely (local news coverage in Boston seems to consist of the Red Sox, Tom Brady, and the possible whereabouts of Whitey Bulger, so I don’t bother following the papers or news broadcasts), but I think it started off with something about how the ISB obtained the property, then some lawsuits, etc.
pi.info 11:01 pm on July 9, 2009 Permalink |
Which new (relocated?) masjid is this?
Len 11:15 pm on July 9, 2009 Permalink |
Yusuf Masjid in Brighton. I think they may have been at another location in Allston prior to moving to their new building about a month ago.
johnpi 8:00 am on July 10, 2009 Permalink |
The extremists’ problem with the Roxbury mosque is that it is a substantial structure and presence in the city and even the region – with a civil engagement mandate to match. Mosque opponents want the Muslim population to be invisible and withdrawn so that they can easily define the Muslim community with their smears.
I believe the mineret was removed to try to appease, but of course it didn’t do any good.
Mosque leaders themselves have said the ISB has an outward looking mandate. From an article by a local Muslim journalist:
The opening ceremony was held last month, and the Massachusetts governor was the headliner (he cancelled at the last minute). The Boston mayor was there though.
Yusuf Masjid, on the other hand, is keeping a very low profile – so much so that when you web search for Boston mosques it doesn’t even show up. Even Muslims are going to have a hard time finding it. Yusuf Masjid isn’t going to attract the kind of attention that ISB does, which made it a target for these extremists.
The goal of silencing Muslim voices in America may also have had something to do with why Jacob and friends successfully prevented the establishment of an Islamic chair at Harvard University (from the Charles Jacobs link above):
johnpi 8:30 am on July 10, 2009 Permalink |
Just to show not all Boston Globe coverage has been negative, here’s a Globe video about the ISB Boston’s first summer camp for children.
Adam Friedman 8:47 pm on July 13, 2009 Permalink |
I am a Jew, I’ve lived in Boston over 10 years, I am researching the mosque situation myself, and I am not sure who to believe. I haven’t heard anyone address Jacobs’ claims of thousands of documentation linking some of the mosque leadership to anti-Semitic and violently anti-homosexual views.
There seems to me so much confusion and misinformation circulating.
Can someone post (and email me) some sources that dispatch with the claims made in Charles Jacobs’ Jerusalem Post article below?
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1246443756960
One inflammatory excerpt:
–begin quote–
THE ISLAMIC Society of Boston Cultural Center offers courses from the Islamic American University, whose vice chairman is Jamal Badawi, a trustee of the center, and headed by Sheik Yusuf al-Qaradawi, a hate-mongering preacher from the Gulf who has been banned from Egypt and the United States. As the spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, he praises suicide bombers, debates the correct way to murder homosexuals, and has urged that the Jews be murdered “to the last one.”
–end quote–
Naturally, if this were true, shouldn’t I be afraid and angry?
As for Charles Jacobs himself, I used to intern at American Anti-Slavery Group, an organization he founded over 10 years ago. At the time I found it a noble and unique effort, to bring attention to the persistent evil of slavery in the modern world. They actually helped Quincy police free a household slave that two BU grad students held hostage in their apartment! (couldnt get access to the full Globe article, but here is the crux: http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-8330321.html)
I made a few presentations to schoolchildren around Boston. But I never met Charles personally.
Thanks for looking further into this, all.