About that Muslims Harass Christian & Jewish Neighbors, Police Refuse to Help Story

Sheila Musaji

Posted Jan 12, 2013      •Permalink      • Printer-Friendly Version
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About that Muslims Harass Christian & Jewish Neighbors, Police Refuse to Help Story

by Sheila Musaji


This particular strategy of the Islamophobia network is getting tiresome. 

Pamela Geller posted #MyJihad in Paris: Muslims Harass, Attack Christian and Jewish Neighbors, Police Refuse to Help in which she published an email she received from an anonymous “Atlas reader” in Paris.

We are supposed to take her word for it that this individual’s statement is true.  Geller, of course, will take the word of anyone who has anything negative to say about Islam and Muslims.

What is the story that Geller must share with the world?

An anonymous reader of her site asks Pamela to help her “tell the world about what is going on here so that people will fight these horrible pigs.”  [the “pigs” she refers to are Muslims.] In her story she complains about the French “socialist government”,  altercations with Muslim neighbors, and bizarre incidents that she is aware of (like Muslims forcing a Jewish child to eat pork or they would kill her parents).

This would be laughable if it wasn’t for the fact that there are individuals who do take Geller’s postings seriously.  This is the sort of incoherent story you get from people walking the streets and talking to themselves. 

Not content with putting this story out on her site, Geller also tweeted it out using the #MyJihad hashtag, as part of her ongoing effort to undermine that positive effort by Muslims to take back the term from both Muslim extremists and Islamophobes.  And, her followers followed suit, tweeting and re-tweeting this “story” using the #MyJihad hashtag. 

Interestingly, the two groups who share extremists views about Islam - the Muslim extremists and the Islamophobes - both attacked the campaign.  Geller & Spencer accused the #MyJihad campaign of inspiring a Chicago bus threat.  They also began churning out articles with the hashtag #MyJihad in their titles, and then tweeting the titles of those articles and encouraging others to re-tweet, in an attempt to take over the #MyJihad hashtag by overwhelming it with hateful messages.  Many of the articles they have come up with have been, even by their standards, disgraceful.  Here are just a few of these false hate pieces from the past few days:  (Don’t worry, the links take you to responses, not the original)  #MyJihad: Egyptian Cleric Warns Christian Women: If You Don’t Wear a Veil You’ll Be Raped - #MyJihad: Muslim cleric tells converts to bury their Christian parents as if they were dead dogs - #MyJihad in Serbia: Kosovo Muslims destroy Serbian Orthodox monastery.  In addition to these new lies, they are recycling many of their old lies in tweets including the hashtag, e.g. #MyJihad 270 million victims of over a millennium of jihadi wars - #MyJihad 17,000+ “Islamic terrorist” attacks since 9/11, etc.   See the RESOURCES FOR DEALING WITH ISLAMOPHOBIA SUMMARY section below for links to responses to many of these current and previous hateful claims. 

Based on Geller’s past performance it is difficult to believe that any sane person could take her rantings seriously, but they do.  I prefer to save myself the trouble and just use the Pamela Geller:  Shrieking Harpy Rant Generator to get my dose of Geller “humor” for the day.

Why does this story sound so familiar?

Geller, and her partner Robert Spencer have proven hundreds of times that they have a Tenuous Grasp of the Concept of “Truth Telling”

One of the many previous lies they spread was very similar to this current one.  In that case Geller posted an article titled “Hate Crime” which shared an email from a reader who had supposedly been harassed by Muslims in her neighborhood and was unable to get law enforcement or elected officials to do anything about it.

In that case, the writer calling herself “Danusha (Redacted) PhD” claimed a Muslim man accosted her and “impeded” her ability to walk down the street, and that Muslims regularly mock her, and one even hit her with his SUV. 

When the article was originally posted it included this introduction to the email by Geller:  “The hypocrisy loooms [sic] large. Here’s a letter I thought I should share with you. I expect the gutless congressman who witnessed his Muslim constituents dancing on 9/11/01 will do nothing but hide beneath his desk. If this continues — auxiliary law enforcement will be necessary.”

Subsequently the original email from the “victim” was removed from Geller’s site, as was Geller’s lead in to the article, and replaced with an almost incoherent rant. In that rant, Geller claimed that ” I’ve removed the letter from this post because of threats to its author. The incredible evil that is standard operating procedure for those on the left led them to try to identify the author, and effectively target her for retribution. Thus I removed the letter. Imagine: this woman lives in fear every day, and the response to this violation of her basic human rights was an attempt to out her and put her life in jeopardy. That’s what we’re dealing with.”  

An article I wrote at the time exposing this nonsense, notes that according to Charles Johnson

... the individual who wrote this letter is Danusha Goska and he links to an email sent to a site called VDARE from this person in 2008.  That email complained about “Hispanic noise pollution” in her neighborhood.  In that email she included a copy of a letter that she had sent to her local mayor and claims that her complaints have gone unanswered.  The VDare site posts a note at the bottom of this post saying Goska, a teacher and Democrat, previously wrote to us about her experience with National Public Radio. with a link to this previous letter.

That link takes you to an email she sent which included an “essay” she had sent to NPR.  At the bottom of the “essay” is this:  Goska, a writer, teacher and Ph.D. from Indiana University does “manual labor to make ends meet.” She submitted this essay to NPR (e-mail) which rejected it.

Johnson also turned up a strange film review posted by a person named Danusha Goska. 

In a simple google search I turned up a number of articles including this one - Islam and Terror: Some Thoughts after 9/11 by Danusha V. Goska, PhD. 

She seems, like Geller to be focused on anti-Muslim rabble rousing.  Geller, rather than explain that she had been taken in by an email from a seemingly unstable person, instead pulled the email, and substituted a rant that still managed to make it seem as if the information contained in that original email was accurate.


This pattern of making outrageous claims based on no evidence at all, and then if caught out, attempting to conceal the evidence is a pattern.


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RESOURCES FOR DEALING WITH ISLAMOPHOBIA SUMMARY

The Islamophobia Industry exists and is engaged in an anti-Muslim Crusade.  They have a manifesto for spreading their propaganda, and which states their goal of “destroying Islam — as a culture, a political ideology, and a religion.” They produce anti-Muslim films.  They are forming new organizations and coalitions of organizations at a dizzying speed, not only nationally, but also internationally.   They have formed an International Leadership Team “which will function as a mobile, proactive, reactive on-the-ground team developing and executing confidential action plans that strike at the heart of the global anti-freedom agenda.”

Currently, the Islamophobia Industry is engaged in a full-scale, coordinated,  demonization campaign against American Muslims and Arabs. In just the past few months we have seen a series of inflammatory provocations:    There was the Innocence of Muslims film Titanic, a German satire magazine plans an “Islam” cover article to be published later this month.   Charlie Hebdo, a French satire magazine published an issue with inflammatory cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad.   Newsweek published their ‘Muslim Rage’ cover.  Terry Jones held a “trial of Prophet Muhammad”.  SION held a “global” gathering in NYC to plan propaganda strategy.  A group in Toronto publicized a “walk your dog at the mosque” day.   AFDI/SIOA has run a series of anti-Muslim ads on public transportation across the country.   AFDI/SIOA are planning to run 8 more anti-Muslim ads.  There are three more films on Prophet Muhammad in the works by Ali Sina, Mosab Hassan Yousef and Imran Farasat.   They are even bringing their hate messages into public schools.

Daniel Pipes is encouraging publication of “A Muhammad cartoon a day”, and says “So, this is my plea to all Western editors and producers: Display the Muhammad cartoon daily, until the Islamists become accustomed to the fact that we turn sacred cows into hamburger.”.  Pipes joins Daniel Greenfield (aka Sultan Knish) who published an appeal on David Horowitz’ Front Page Magazine Is It Time for ‘Make Your Own Mohammed Movie Month’?.  And, both are following in the footsteps of such luminaries as Pamela Geller, who promoted just such a plan back in 2010 with her promotion of Draw Muhammad Day, even after the cartoonist who drew the first cartoon and suggested the idea, Molly Norris apologized to Muslims and asked for the day to be called off, and American Muslims had issued a defense of free speech.    None of this is surprising as one of the Islamophobes laid out their strategy as “The Muslims themselves have shown us their most vulnerable spot, which is the questionable (though unquestioned) character of the ‘Prophet’ himself. We need to satirise and ridicule baby-bonking Mo until the Muslims fly into uncontrollable tantrums, then ridicule them even more for their tantrums, and repeat the process until they froth at the mouth and steam comes out of their ears.”

The Islamophobia of these folks is very real, it is also strikingly similar to a previous generations’ anti-Semitism, and it has predictable consequences.   The reason that this is so obvious to so many is that rational people can tell the difference between legitimate concerns and bigoted stereotypes.

Sadly, the Islamophobic echo chamber has been aided by some in the Jewish and Christian clergy, and even by some of our elected representatives, particularly in the GOP.

The claim that the Islamophobes are “truth-tellers” and “defenders of freedom” who actually “love Muslims” and have never engaged in “broadbrush demonization” or “advocated violence”, or that nothing that they say could have had anything to do with any act of violence,  are nonsense.  The claim that they are falsely being accused of Islamophobia for no reason other than their legitimate concerns about real issues and that in fact there is not even such a thing as Islamophobia, or their claim that the fact that there are fewer hate crimes against Muslims than against Jews or that some Muslims have fabricated such crimes “proves” that Islamophobia doesn’t exist,  or that the term Islamophobia was made up by Muslims in order to stifle their freedom of speech, or that anti-Muslim bigotry is “not Islamophobia but Islamorealism” are all nonsense

These individuals and organizations consistently promote the false what everyone “knows” lies about Islam and Muslims (including distorting the meaning of Qur’anic verses, and distorting the meaning of Islamic terms such as taqiyya, jihad, sharia, etc.).  Islamophobes falsely claim to see “JIHAD” PLOTS everywhere, particularly where they don’t exist.   They, like Muslim extremists, don’t understand the true meaning of the term jihad.  The Islamophobes have uncovered countless examples of “shocking”, non-existent Muslim jihad plots.

Islamophobes generalize specific incidents to reflect on all Muslims or all of Islam.    Islamophobes consistently push demonstrably false memes such as:  - we are in danger from creeping Sharia, - the Muslim population is increasing at an alarming rate, - 80% of American Mosques are radicalized,  -  There have been 270 million victims of “jihad”  -  There have been 17,000+ “Islamic terrorist” attacks since 9/11    - Muslims in government are accused of being Muslim Brotherhood plants, stealth jihadists, and creeping Sharia proponents and should be MARGINALIZED or excluded.  Muslim and Arab organizations and individuals are connected to the infamous Muslim Brotherhood document or the unindicted co-conspirator label, or accused of not condemning Hamas, telling American Muslims not to talk to the FBI, of being “Jew haters”, etc.

When Islamophobes are caught in the act of making up or distorting claims they engage in devious methods to attempt to conceal the evidence. 

When Islamophobes are caught in the act of making up or distorting claims they engage in devious methods to attempt to conceal the evidence. 

There is a reason that many, even outside of the Muslim community see such demonization of Muslims as Islamophobic.  There is a reason that the ADL has stated that Brigitte Gabriel’s Act for America, Pamela Geller & Robert Spencer’s Stop the Islamization of America (SIOA), David Yerushalmi’s Society of Americans for National Existence (SANE)  are “groups that promote an extreme anti-Muslim agenda”.  There is a reason that The Southern Poverty Law Center has designated SIOA as a hate group, and that these individuals are featured in the SPLC reports Jihad Against Islam and The Anti-Muslim Inner Circle.  There is a reason that these individuals and organizations are featured prominently in: — the Center for American Progress reports “Fear Inc.” on the Islamophobia network in America and Understanding Sharia Law: Conservatives skewed interpretation needs debunking. — the People for the American Way Right Wing Playbook on Anti-Muslim Extremism.  — the NYCLU report Religious Freedom Under Attack:  The Rise of Anti-Mosque Activities in New York State.  — the Political Research Associates report Manufacturing the Muslim menace: Private firms, public servants, and the threat to rights and security.  — The ACLU report Nothing to Fear: Debunking the Mythical “Sharia Threat” to Our Judicial System — in The American Muslim TAM Who’s Who of the Anti-Muslim/Anti-Arab/Islamophobia Industry.   There is a reason that the SIOA’s trademark patent was denied by the U.S. government due to its anti-Muslim nature.   There is a reason that these individuals and organizations are featured in just about every legitimate report on Islamophobia and anti-Muslim hatred. 

See Resources for dealing with Islamophobes for many more reasons that these people cannot be trusted.



Sheila Musaji is the founding editor of The American Muslim (TAM), published since 1989.  Sheila received the Council on American-Islamic Relations 2007 Islamic Community Service Award for Journalism,  and the Loonwatch Anti-Loons of 2011: Profiles in Courage Award for her work in fighting Islamophobia.  Sheila was selected for inclusion in the 2012 edition of The Muslim 500: The World’s 500 Most Influential Muslims published since 2009 by the Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Centre in Amman, Jordan.    Biography  You can follow her on twitter @sheilamusaji ( https://twitter.com/SheilaMusaji )



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