I attended the much-hyped Muslim prayer rally on Capitol Hill on Friday, September 25th. You can watch my coverage of the event on the 700 Club here. The rally has to be considered a colossal flop if you judge it by the numbers. About 3,000 people showed up, far below the anticipated 50,000 Muslim worshippers that the event's organizers were trumpeting on their website (which, incidentally, included the slogan, "Our time has come.").
But for sheer psychological impact, there is certainly something striking about seeing 3,000 Muslims bowing in unison in prayer before the seat of the U.S. government (watch my piece and you'll see what I mean). Particularly coming as it did just two weeks after the eighth anniversary of 9/11, and amid a slew of recent terrorism arrests on U.S. soil.
The event's emcee and organizer, Hassan Abdellah, failed to mention any of those arrests or to condemn acts of Islamic terrorism. There was no condemnation of Al Qaeda, the Taliban, Hamas, Hezbollah or Iran's mad mullahs. Abdellah payed lip service to how America was "the best nation in the world for Muslims to live in," but seemed to have a very conflicted view of the country, alternately praising it and condeming it for, in his view, being unfair to Muslims since 9/11. One thing Abdellah made abundantly clear was his belief that Islam was the answer to America's problems. Abdellah, by the way, is a controversial figure and far from a moderate. As an attorney, he has represented Islamic terrorists in court. His take seems to be that whenever a Muslim is arrested on terror charges, it is part of a paranoid, anti-Islamic witch hunt.
The gathering was peaceful, and Abdellah and other attendees did their best to put on a moderate veneer. In one-on-one interviews, they went to great pains to hold to a politically correct, can't-we-all-just-get-along line. However, the mask did slip on a few ocassions, as you'll see in my piece. One white convert told us his loyalty was to Islam before America. Another man told us that "Islam is on the rise" in the United States. When he asked whether he woudl resort to violence in the name of Allah, he hesitated before answering "We're not one to turn the other cheek, put it that way." No kidding! He then went on to renounce violence. Very reassuring.
I supect that candid moments like that were far more indicative of the crowd's general feelings and worldview. And that's a problem. The situation was probably summed up best by some former Muslims who stood outside the event handing out Bibles and Christian DVD's. They refused to go on camera with us because they feared for their safety. That about says it all.