Two counter-jihad ads my organization, the American Freedom Defense Initiative (AFDI), began running last week in New York and San Francisco are causing quite a stir. Dhimmi public officials and media are falling all over themselves in furious efforts to enforce the restrictions on free speech the Shariah prescribes.
In New York, the ads are running in Metro-North stations just north of New York City, as well as in the Bronx. They say, “*19,250 deadly Islamic attacks since 9/11/01. *And counting. It’s not Islamophobia, it’s Islamorealism.”
Greenburgh, N.Y., Town Supervisor Paul Feiner wants Metro-North to warn passengers that the ads could be upsetting and don’t represent Metro-North’s views or those of the community. And Peter Swiderski, the mayor of Hastings-on-Hudson, sent a letter to the entire village asking people to write to the MTA to express “dismay” over our ads. Our ads are statements of fact. There have been, as of this writing, over 19,460 deadly Islamic attacks since 9/11. How is it “Islamophobic” to point that out?
Why didn’t Feiner or Swiderski react as viscerally when the same kiosks had vicious blood libels posted about Israel? They are apparently OK with anti-Jewish ads. Their bias is showing.
Feiner said, “[Muslims] should not be discriminated against. The posters encourage hatred, discrimination and do not help the efforts to fight hate crimes.” Feiner implies that all Muslims support jihad. Sounds as if Feiner is painting all Muslims with the same brush. How “Islamophobic.” It is “Islamophobic” and a real attempt to paint all Muslims as jihadists to suggest that all Muslims would oppose attempts to rein in the jihadists.
There are signs all over NYC transit that read, “If you see something, say something.” Are those “Islamophobic,” too? Do the dhimmi tools think they also should be removed?
Meanwhile, NBC News reporter Jonathan Vigliotti actually told me that the fact that the ad mentioned 9/11 was “hateful.” I said, what could be more hateful than the largest and bloodiest attack on American soil in U.S. history? We are supposed to scrub that from our history books now? We can’t say “9/11” because that offends Muslims, too? Needless to say, that exchange didn’t make it on the air. As a matter of fact, as is characteristic of mainstream media reporting, little of what I said made it into his report.
The Wall Street Journal wrote that our ad “associates Islam with 19,250 terrorist attacks carried out by extremists since the 9/11.” Uh, no. I didn’t associate Islam with those terror attacks. The jihadists screaming “Allahu akbar” and citing Quran chapter and verse were associating Islam with those terror attacks. How knuckleheaded can the WSJ be?
It’s also interesting that the media went to the Anti-Defamation League for comment on my ads. No one takes the ADL seriously. Abe Foxman is an embarrassment to our community (he still refuses to call the murder of millions in the Armenian genocide a “genocide”). The ADL’s mission is now to attack Jews and run interference for anti-Semites. I equate the media going to the ADL for comment with the media going to Hamas-linked AIR for comment. Neither represents the people they claim to represent.
After all, why was there no comparable brouhaha when two vicious anti-Israel ads ran – nothing like the reaction there has been over a statement of real fact? There was no concern in the media about “hate speech” and incitement to violence against Jews by those dishonest messages. The actual story here is the systemic and institutionalized bias in the media.
In San Francisco, our ads say, “In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support the civilized man. Support Israel. Defeat jihad.”
Scott Goldstein, President of Titan Transit advertising, called me Friday. Titan handles the outdoor ads for San Francisco Muni and BART.
In an unprecedented move, the city of San Francisco is placing ads right next to every one of our pro-Israel ads on San Francisco Muni buses, saying (according to ABC 7 San Francisco) “Muni condemns statements that describe any group as savages.”
This is unprecedented in the history of outdoor advertising. This is the manifestation of Shariah in Western society. Any war on innocent civilians is savage. They are reading into my ad the idea that “all Muslims” or “all Arabs” want to destroy Israel. That is nowhere in my message. They are the Islamophobes and racists.
The rush to assure the world that the “Palestinian” jihadists are not savages amazes me. The war on Israel is a war on innocent civilians. The targeting of civilians is savage. The relentless 60-year campaign of terror against the Jewish people is savage. The torture of hostage Gilad Shalit was savage. The bloody hacking to death of the Fogel family was savage. The Munich Olympic massacre was savage. The unspeakable torture of Ehud Goldwasser was savage. The tens of thousands of rockets fired from Gaza into southern Israel (into schools, homes, etc.) are savage. The vicious Jew-hatred behind this genocide is savage. The endless demonization of the Jewish people in the Palestinian and Arab media is savage. The refusal to recognize the state of Israel as a Jewish state is savage. The list is endless.
But what galls me here again are the scores of anti-Israel ads that ran in San Francisco without a disclaimer. Why didn’t they have a problem with the anti-Jewish ads? Why did they not run this disclaimer next to those ads? That silence is sanction and tacit approval. Institutionalized anti-Semitism. Who cares if Muni approves the message or not? It is not their job to agree or disagree.
The truth is not offensive. The millions slaughtered in jihad – that is offensive to free men.
