New York, U.S.A. — The New York chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-NY) called on state and federal law enforcement authorities to investigate uncooked bacon scattered at the site of a planned prayer in Staten Island marking the end of the month-long fast of Ramadan as a possible hate crime.

CAIR-NY also asked political candidates seeking office in the November elections to stop promoting and exploiting anti-Muslim prejudice and urged all elected officials to repudiate growing anti-Muslim hate.

According to the organizers of the Sunday prayer service, the bacon was apparently used to desecrate the prayer site at Staten Island’s New Dorp Beach park. They discovered the bacon Sunday morning as they arrived at the site. (Muslims are prohibited from eating pork products and anti-Muslim bigots often use the animal as a means to taunt or offend Muslims, such as in a similar incident recently targeting a California mosque.)

The planned site for the prayer service was made public in local news media the night before.

Comments on a Staten Island Advance online article covering the Muslim holiday, by a person identified as “midland007,” stated: (Spelling and grammatical errors maintained.)

“I am going to walk my pet pig and i am gonna let him take a nice fat dump in the field ….just in time for morning prayers (:” And: “They should send in a assault team and rid Staten island of all the muslim terrorists”

The Muslim community in America celebrated the end of Ramadan with communal Eid ul-Fitr prayers around the country on Sunday 19th. Ramadan is the month on the Islamic lunar calendar during which Muslims abstain from food, drink and other pleasures from sunrise to sunset.

On Friday, CAIR said that in light of recent hate incidents targeting American Muslims, it was asking mosques and Islamic institutions nationwide to step up security for the end-of-Ramadan prayers. In its advisory, CAIR noted that in the past few days alone, hate incidents in Illinois included desecration of Muslim graves, a shooting at a mosque in Morton Grove and an acid bomb thrown at an Islamic school in Lombard.

In other states, a mosque was burned to the ground in Joplin, Mo., vandals sprayed an Oklahoma mosque with paintballs, pigs legs were thrown at a mosque-site in California, and a firebomb was thrown at a Muslim family’s home in Panama City, Fla.

“These incidents are not a coincidence. We believe the recent surge in acts of bigotry and hatred is directly linked to the words of elected officials and those running for office who have used anti-Muslim bigotry as a campaign strategy,” said CAIR-NY Executive Director Muneer Awad.

He said Rep. Bob Turner, New York State Senator David Storobin and Assembly candidate Ben Askelrod, among others, have expressed public opposition to Muslim houses of worship being built in New York.

Image Courtesy of  aclu.socal

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Truth Wins Out sent an open letter to Montgomery School Superintendent Joshua Starr strongly urging him to stop disseminating “ex-gay” fliers by the discredited organization Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays (PFOX). The virulently anti-gay group distributed 8,000 sheets at five Montgomery County schools in the span of a week, even though Starr calls the fliers “reprehensible and deplorable.”

“While non-profit literature must not be blocked based on viewpoint, it can and should be prohibited if it contains blatant misinformation that jeopardizes the health and well being of students,” wrote TWO’s Executive Director Wayne Besen in the letter to Starr. “The PFOX flier easily fits this description and the group has a dubious history that includes bizarre and bigoted practices that have no place in your public school system.”

The letter points out that PFOX board member Peter Sprigg, who works for Southern Poverty Law Center hate group the Family Research Council, once said that he wanted to “export” LGBT people and that he supports criminalizing homosexuality. In August 2010, PFOX president Greg Quinlan spoke at a conference where he made an outrageous and offensive anti-gay slur:

“I wasn’t your flaming faggot, you know,” Quinlan said. “I can say that because I’ve been there and done that. You know, the one’s whose wrists are so limp that when the wind blows they slap themselves in the face. I wasn’t one of them.”

“Let’s not beat around the bush: If an unsavory organization insulted other minorities with despicable epithets and demanded that they be ‘exported’ or jailed – no school in Montgomery County would be distributing their leaflets,” TWO’s letter said. “The fact that you would allow this politically motivated organization to spread its noxious message about LGBT people shows an unreasonable and unfathomable double standard.”

Furthermore, the former president of PFOX, Richard Cohen, was permanently expelled from the American Counseling Association for multiple ethics violations. Cohen is the individual most associated with the discredited mental health techniques trumpeted by PFOX.

Image Courtesy of   Zherui WU / Shutterstock.com

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