Rep.-elect Keith (Hakim-Mohammed) Ellison, D-Minn., has drawn fire for asking to take the constitutional oath on the Quran rather than the Bible at a swearing-in ceremony next month.
The Constitution specifies that members of Congress shall be bound by an oath to support the constitutional law of the land. In the oath, Ellison will be required to swear to "support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic ... without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion."
Critics argue he has conflicting loyalties, while Ellison insists he's a patriot.
But within days of being elected, Ellison held a workshop on
politics for a group closely affiliated with a radical Islamic school that preaches no Muslim can pledge loyalty to the Constitution or make laws outside the laws of the Quran, which the school's leaders assert is the "supreme law" of the land, trumping all man-made laws including the U.S. Constitution.
A black convert to orthodox Sunni Islam, Ellison spoke to the North American Imams Federation, or NAIF, at the group's Nov. 19 conference in Minneapolis.
His talk flowed into a breakout session listed on the agenda simply as "American Open University," according to the conference program. It turns out the university is a "distance-learning" center based in Alexandria, Va., and known to local law enforcement as "Wahhabi Online."
Later that day, Ellison met with NAIF's president, Omar Ahmad Shahin, who lectures at the same
American Open University. (He also met at the time with New York imam Siraj Wahhaj, an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.) The radical Islamic school trains many of NAIF's more than 150 members, who control mosques across America.
American Open University supports Sharia, or Islamic law. And its founder and chairman,
Jaafar Sheikh Idris, has denounced the U.S system of democracy as "the antithesis of Islam" and argued no man has the right to make laws outside Allah's laws expressed in the Quran.
"There is a basic difference between Islam and this form of democracy," he says. "The basic difference is that in Islam it is [Allah's] law as expressed in the Quran and the Sunna that is the supreme law within the limits of which people have the right to legislate.
"No one can be a Muslim who makes or freely accepts or believes that anyone has the right to make or accept legislation that is contrary to that divine law," Idris adds. "Examples of such violations include the legalization of alcoholic drinks, gambling, homosexuality, usury or interest, and even adoption."
Conversely, laws prohibiting polygamy and domestic violence also violate the Quran.
Further, he maintains that no Muslim elected to Congress or the White House can swear to uphold the U.S. Constitution and still be a Muslim.
"No Muslim could become president in a secular regime, for in order to pledge loyalty to the constitution, a Muslim would have to abandon part of his belief and embrace the belief of secularism - which is practically another religion. For Muslims, the word 'religion' does not only refer to a collection of beliefs and rituals, it refers to a way of life which includes all values, behaviors and details of living," Idris says. "Separation of religion and state is not an option for Muslims because it requires us to abandon [Allah's] decree for that of a man."
He further explains: "Islam cannot be separated from the state because it guides Muslims through every detail of running the state and their lives. Muslims have no choice but to reject secularism for it excludes the laws of [Allah]."
Also, he asserts that "there is absolutely no compromise: Any belief that contradicts Islam is false."
Backed by CAIR
Ellison's campaign was backed by the Washington-based lobby group
Council on American-Islamic Relations, a partner organization to American Open University-affiliated NAIF. CAIR held fundraisers for Ellison, a civil-rights lawyer and one-time acolyte of Louis Farrakhan who admits to making anti-Semitic remarks in the past (under various alias including Keith Hakim, Keith Ellison-Muhammad and Keith X Ellison).
CAIR's founder has
argued the Quran should replace the Constitution as the highest authority in the land. The group's director of communications, moreover, has expressed his desire to see the U.S. become an Islamic state. CAIR is an offshoot of the Islamic Association for Palestine, a suspected front for the terrorist group Hamas.
Pundit Dennis Prager and other critics have demanded Ellison take the constitutional oath on the Bible, arguing the constitution derives its authority from the Bible, not the Quran. If Ellison puts his hand on the Quran, Prager says he would be in effect nullifying his oath and undermining "American civilization."
"He should not be allowed to do so," he asserted in a recent
column.
Another critic, Glenn Beck of CNN, questioned Ellison's loyalties. "Sir, prove to me that you are not working with our enemies," he asked Ellison on a recent show.
"There's no one who is more patriotic than I am," Ellison replied. "And so, you know, I don't need to prove my patriotic stripes."
Others point out Ellison has shown a pattern of disrespect for U.S. laws, raising the question whether he's qualified to make law. Failure to pay his taxes resulted in liens on his home. Failure to pay more than 40 parking and traffic tickets has twice led to suspension of his Minnesota license. He's also racked up hefty fines from campaign finance violations and defended the leader of a cop-killing gang.
Red flags
In addition to CAIR, the NAIF-affiliated American Open University, however, has raised a number of red flags at the FBI, including the fact that:
Last month's NAIF conference program outlining Ellison's session, titled "Imams and Politics," says Muslim involvement in Western politics is a "sensitive" issue.
"Imams must be able to provide Muslims with the proper guidance and educate them on the etiquettes [sic] of any political involvement within the Islamic context," the program says. "Questions also arise on whether imams and Islamic centers should be involved in politics at all and what the extent of this involvement should be."
Transcripts of his talk and the subsequent breakout session on American Open University were not made available to the public.
Home
Originally Posted by Kenneth
Bookmarks