2011-03-03 "Meanwhile, In Orange County: Hate Is at Home" by Lindsay William-Ross / LAist
[http://sfist.com/2011/03/03/meanwhile_in_orange_county_hate_is.php]
A video posted yesterday to YouTube shows footage from a February, 13th protest in Yorba Linda, held outside a fundraising event held by the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA), with a goal of aiding women's shelters, and fighting homelessness and hunger in the US. The protesters were there to speak out against "what they called the group’s agenda to impose Sharia (Islamic law) on American society," explains the Jewish Journal. "They were particularly upset with the event’s keynote speakers, New York cleric Imam Siraj Wahhaj and Amir Abdel Malik Ali, whom they said hold anti-American, anti-Israel and anti-Semitic views."
The protest got underway mid-afternoon, following several days of grassroots organizing. While politicians in the OC attempted to stop the $25-a-plate event, or force them to choose a different speaker, people from all over Southern California, including Los Angeles, planned the protest. "In the afternoon, the event had the atmosphere of a July 4 picnic. Many brought lawn chairs and blankets, sang patriotic songs and tied red, white and blue bandanas on their dogs," said the OC Register.
A group of about 100 splintered off from the principal group of protesters, including some who carried signs that linked ICNA to Hamas and Hezbollah. ICNA's spokesperson said those people did not know the facts about the organization, adding "We have no links to any overseas organization. We absolutely denounce violence and terrorism."
However, notes the Register, "Malik Ali is a Bay Area Islamic activist who spoke at 'Israeli Apartheid Week' at UC Irvine in 2010. There he said he supports Hezbollah, which the CIA labels a terrorist group."
The message, though, as heard in the shouts of the protesters, was that the people at the event were terrorists, child molesters, and wife-beaters, who worship a fraudulent prophet, and, above all else, are not welcome in not only Yorba Linda, but also in America.
Among the protesters were Rabbi Dov Fischer of Young Israel of Orange County, Irvine Jewish activist Dee Sterling and U.S. Congressmen Ed Royce (R-CA), Gary Miller (R-CA), and Chapman University adjunct professor of law Karen Lugo, who said "This is not about hate [...] We are not hatemongers. The world Islamophobia is an effort to chill us. The Constitution was never meant to allow a tyranny of a minority."