Fire at Tenn. Mosque Building Site Ruled Arson

[fallstuff]

Fire at Tenn. Mosque Building Site Ruled Arson


(CBS/AP) Updated at 9:25 p.m. ET

Federal officials are investigating a fire that started overnight at the site of a new Islamic center in a Nashville suburb.

Ben Goodwin of the Rutherford County Sheriff's Department confirmed to CBS Affiliate WTVF that the fire, which burned construction equipment at the future site of the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro, is being ruled as arson.

Special Agent Andy Anderson of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives told CBS News that the fire destroyed one piece of construction equipment and damaged three others. Gas was poured over the equipment to start the fire, Anderson said.

The ATF, FBI and Rutherford County Sheriff's Office are conducting a joint investigation into the fire, Anderson said.

WTVF reports firefighters were alerted by a passerby who saw flames at the site. One large earth hauler was set on fire before the suspect or suspects left the scene.

The chair of the center's planning committee, Essim Fathy, said he drove to the site at around 5:30 a.m. Saturday morning after he was contacted by the sheriff's department.

"Our people and community are so worried of what else can happen," said Fathy. "They are so scared."

The fire was smoldering by the time Fathy and the center's imam, Ossama Bahloul, had arrived. Fathy was told that responders had smelled gasoline near the fire.

Fathy was later contacted by members of the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security, who told him the incident was under investigation and to remain calm.

Digging had begun at the site, which was planned as a place of worship for the approximately 250 Muslim families in the Murfreesboro area, but no structure had been built yet, according to Saleh Sbenaty, a member of the planning committee and a professor of engineering technology at Middle Tennessee State University.

"This is a shock," said Sbenaty. "We've had small act of vandals. But this is going to be a crime and whoever did it, they should be punished to the full extent of the law."

The center had operated for years out of a small business suite. Planning members said the new building, which was being constructed next to a church, would help accommodate the area's growing Muslim community.

"We unfortunately did not experience hostilities for the 30 years we've been here and have only seen the hostility since approval of the site plan for the new center," said Sbenaty.

Opponents of a new Islamic center say they believe the mosque will be more than a place of prayer; they are afraid the 15-acre site that was once farmland will be turned into a terrorist training ground for Muslim militants bent on overthrowing the U.S. government.

"They are not a religion. They are a political, militaristic group," Bob Shelton, a 76-year-old retiree who lives in the area, told The Associated Press.

Shelton was among several hundred demonstrators who recently wore "Vote for Jesus" T-shirts and carried signs that said "No Sharia law for USA!," referring to the Islamic code of law.

Others took their opposition further, spray painting a sign announcing the "Future site of the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro" and tearing it up.

Earlier this summer opponents criticized the planned mosque at hearings held by the Rutherford County Commission, as supporters held prayer vigils.

At one such prayer vigil, WTVF reported opponents speaking out against construction.

"No mosque in Murfreesboro. I don't want it. I don't want them here," Evy Summers said to WTVF. "Go start their own country overseas somewhere. This is a Christian country. It was based on Christianity."

Link:

Murfreesboro, Tennessee Mosque Plan Draws Criticism from Residents - ABC News

The Associated Press: Fire at proposed Tenn. mosque site probed by feds

 

[fallstuff]

This is what I was pointing out to fellow forum members, its not about the location. No matter where you want to move the Islamic Center, the hate crowd will be there.

I am not going to stick it on the average American. However, this is what happens when the hate machine goes on over-drive.

 

[FreekiN]

Some of my fellow Americans need a smack down.

 

[muse]

"No mosque in Murfreesboro. I don't want it. I don't want them here," Evy Summers said to WTVF. "Go start their own country overseas somewhere. This is a Christian country. It was based on Christianity

And Yet to some, if pools are to be believed, a significant majority of Americans, such "sentiment" are the substance of their position with regard to Muslims in the US - we had earlier warned that the US population backed up by the behaviour of a section of the US government (Dept of Justice) gives credence, offers support, for such attitudes.

The US seems rudderless, has lost it's moral compass - and attitudes such as thoise quoted above are a reflection of what US politicans and US government have chosen as a way to deflect difficult questions they might have had to answer were the public thinking about these issues in a sane and critical manner.

Americans find that all of the stuff the neocons sold them as rationales for the wars inflicted on the US public, have been hollow nonsense, they find their economy in ruins, running of a sea fo gren ink, their economic vitality sapped in scandals where trillions of dollars evaporated in a matter of days, these Americans have had to contend withthe reality that while American ideals are held in great respect, American policy is reviled the world over and worse, these politicians and government officials betray the very ideals they say they are promoting abroad - is it any wonder why such attitudes as the one quoted above continue to spread?

What can bring the public back to sanity?, The determination to confront this insanity with the law, that is the only thing that will bring the public back from the brink of bigotry, frustration and desperation.

 

[fallstuff]

Fire and Gunshots at Tennessee Mosque Site Called ‘Terrorism’- NY Times

On Sunday, one day after a fire at the site of a planned Islamic center and mosque in the Nashville suburb of Murfreesboro, Muslim community members reported hearing gunshots as they inspected the damage.

Saleh Sbenaty, an engineering professor at Middle Tennessee State University who is on the the Islamic center’s planning committee, told The Daily News Journal of Murfreesboro that nine shots, in two volleys, were fired near the property while he and female family members looked at construction equipment burned in the fire. Mr. Sbenaty, who has lived in Tennessee for three decades, said, “It was nothing like a hunting rifle.”

He added:

We hope for the best, obviously, but this isn’t hunting land. There’s plenty of houses around here…. To say we’re nervous is a huge understatement. It’s terrorism.

On Saturday morning, the local sheriff’s department informed members of the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro that one piece of construction equipment at the site had been burned and three others were doused with some sort of fluid but not set alight.

Camie Ayash, a spokesperson for the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro, told Nashville’s News Channel 5:

If it is some kind of sign, and the message is to be scared, honestly it’s working.

In a statement posted on the center’s Web site, Ms. Ayash called the fire an “arson attack” and an “atrocious act of terrorism.”

There have been protests against the construction of mosques and Islamic centers in several parts of the country this year, by protesters carrying signs with slogans like “Mosques Are Monuments to Terrorism,” but opposition to the Tennessee project, in the heart of the Bible Belt, has been particularly heated. In July, opponents of the Murfreesboro center rallied the same day that Tennessee’s lieutenant governor, Ron Ramsey, was filmed saying that Islam may be “a cult” rather than a religion.

Last week, a columnist for The Murfreesboro Post wrote of the proposed Islamic center in the same Lower Manhattan neighborhood as the site of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center:

It wouldn’t have been right if Lee Harvey Oswald’s family had expressed a desire to bury him near the Grassy Knoll, would it?

The Tennessean reported on Sunday that federal agents are involved in the investigation of the fire, which damaged four pieces of construction equipment. A spokesman for the the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives told the newspaper that the agency had not yet determined whether the fire was arson.

Murfreesboro’s Daily News Journal reported on Monday that two federal agencies are involved in the investigation:

Keith Moses, assistant special agent in charge of the F.B.I.’s Nashville office, said charred portions of the truck were collected as evidence Sunday, but it is too soon to tell what type of accelerant was used.

Special Agent Eric Kehn of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms’s Nashville office said it could take a few days or weeks to determine what was used to set the fire.

Earlier this month, Mr. Sbenaty told NPR that a sign announcing the new center had been vandalized twice before the fire, but that the sudden objections to Muslims in the community this year have come as a shock after years of peace:

We are extremely surprised, actually, because, you know, the almost 30 years that I’ve been in Tennessee, I haven’t had any issues about my religion. People respect me and I respect them. My kids grew up here and, you know, their friends, actually, we know their families and so on. So we were really surprised and we did not have any indication before we put the sign on our new property.

And then the first indication was vandalism to the sign, you know, wrote on the sign: Not welcome. And then later on, you know, they broke the sign totally.

After the first reports of possible arson at the site, Kevin Fisher, a local resident who has led protests against the construction of the Islamic center and mosque, said in a statement that he did not support “vigilantism.”

He added:

We who stand in opposition to this mosque have made our concerns known through proper legal channels and have conducted ourselves with dignity, respect and out of a spirit of love for our community, and we will continue to do so.

Middle Tennesseans for Religious Freedom announced on Facebook that it plans to hold a “Candlelight Vigil Condemning Violence Against the New Islamic Center Site” on Monday night on the steps of the Rutherford County Courthouse in Murfreesboro.


Link:

Fire at Mosque Site in Tennessee Spreads Fear - NYTimes.com

 

[Coltsfan]

Sad as this incident is, Tennessee is one of the stereotypical southern states.......

check out one of their candidates for Gov